Splintered Suns

by Michael Cobley

  “There is a compelling reason behind this. Historically, one of the Legacy’s Custodians infiltrated his way onto the Mighty Defender, after the other two crystal fragments were stowed aboard as part of the general plunder of treasures from unguarded vaults across the Imperial homeworld. Through guile and ruthlessness, this Custodian took possession of the fragments and was heading towards one of the lifeboats when one of Raven’s minions caught up with him. Thus the Custodian became a courier, bringing the original pieces of the crystal up to the bridge.”

  “You found this out how?”

  “One of the many summaries which the Legacy, arrogant in its assumption of impregnability, was passing into one of its archives here. Now do you see the dark gravity of the situation? The consequences of failure would be catastrophic and it is up to you to convince your counterpart of this.”

  Pyke crossed his arms and rubbed his chin. “If it was me, I wouldn’t accept it on someone’s say-so, even if it was me saying it. Nah, I’d need more …” He snapped his fingers. “Got an idea, but it depends on your neuropathic conduit thing …”

  He explained his plan to the drone, which quickly saw its merits. “The proposed conduit would have ample capacity for such data-streams. This is a viable plan.”

  Pyke laughed and clapped his hands together.

  “Epic! Let’s go get our big boots on!”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Pyke, the planet Ong, the wreck of the Mighty Defender, forward section

  Following Hokajil’s lead, with his updated time-thrower smoothing the way, they took an odd winding route up through the decks, with the latest rest-stop here at the starboard observation lounge.

  Just two decks below the bridge, he thought, as he leaned on a padded windowsill, gazing out at the twisting flows of hyperspace. And about twenty-four hours before the first encounter with the Damaugra. That should be a sight when we finally reach the bridge …

  Hokajil’s time-thrower was an amazing piece of kit. It could narrow the temporal field to the width of a corridor or up to the specific area of a room of any size. What would have been an uncertain journey became an uneventful trip through carefully chosen areas of the ship. Hokajil’s explanation for the roundabout detour was that Raven’s allied factions favoured the more direct path due to its proximity to certain time-facet “breakthrough points.”

  That said, before leaving the lounge-lobby, Pyke had stood beside Hokajil while his three attendants threw the Raven-double prisoners into a facet where the Damaugra’s attacks had torn open a large rent in the hull. As he watched them writhe and choke to death in hard vacuum, Pyke had felt no satisfaction, no remorse, no anger, just a cold, grey nothing. And right then, in those horrible moments, he had so wanted to feel something. But all he felt was a weird dampening absence, as if a cap had been screwed down tight over anything that resembled a real, sharp-edged emotion. Dulled, he was. Blunted.

  He looked around him at the busy observation lounge, nearly full of well-dressed passengers chattering away with that oblivious cheeriness that only the very rich can project, a rushing river of gossip and the smallest of small talk. There were a few crew members scattered around, mostly mid-ranking officers, all unsuspecting of the doom that was heading their way. Unsuspecting, also, of how their shadow lives had been called into existence purely for the benefit of some travellers who were only passing through. Hokajil had promised that once the crystal shard was destroyed he would use the time-thrower on the bridge section, sending it forward to the real present, ending the cycles of the time-zones and the fracturing facets.

  Right now, however, Hokajil was off seeing one of his “scouts” in the area while his three armed companions stayed to watch over Pyke. Hokajil had made two previous stop-offs like this, always with the watchwords “cautious and cagey” in case any of Raven’s allies were sneaking around. And yet, Pyke had this flickery thread of unease at the back of his mind, a faint tingle of distrust whenever Hokajil opened his mouth and spoke.

  “Right skagger of a thing, eh?” said a voice behind him. “There ye are, Branny No-Mates, finding yerself at the mercy of a dodgy hustler with a fancy time-gadget.”

  The voice was familiar and the figure standing about a yard away was entirely too familiar. A pleasing spike of anger popped in his thoughts but, before he could put it into a few choice words, the newcomer went on:

  “Wait, don’t say anything yet—you need to hear this.” This other him was an aggravating jerk. “First thing to realise is that no one else can see me, only you. Here’s some proof …”

  The other Pyke stretched out a hand and wafted it back and forth, in and out of his chest and the heavy jacket he was wearing.

  “So, no sudden arm gestures if you please, no speaking or shouting out loud either. Otherwise Hokajil’s playmates might get a bit nosey and start meddling. Just whisper or subvocalise whatever you need to say and I’ll hear it.”

  “So what the frack are you?” Pyke muttered. “A projection?”

  “You could say that,” said the other Pyke, with a half-smile he’d only ever seen in the mirror. “This performance is coming to you live from the simulation inside the crystal currently languishing inside your jacket there!” He grinned and did jazz hands. “For one night only!”

  Pyke had to force himself not to look down to where the crystal shard made a slight lump in his jacket’s appearance.

  “How … is that even possible?” he whispered.

  “Oh, controlling the crystal’s outer layers, neuropathic fields, attuning to your brainwavicles, blah-blah-blah—what matters is that I am you, up to the moment that we took a header out of that tenth-floor window.”

  “You remember that bit.”

  “Just the bastard-Legacy prancing out onto that windowsill, then deliberately falling backwards and letting go of the bloody crystal.” The Pyke apparition gave a slow shake of the head. “It’s amazing that you survived.”

  Pyke smiled. “Dervla,” he said.

  “She is brilliant, you know that,” said Simulation Pyke. “The number of times she’s saved my arse …” There was a pause. “You were there, you saw what the Legacy did. To her.”

  He nodded, afraid to remember, afraid to speak for a moment. “Is she … did she make it through to the simulation?”

  “Oh, she did. So did Ancil, by the way.”

  “Good—that’s good. What about the other three from the Isle of Candles?”

  “Vrass, T’Moy and Klane? They’re still part of the gang, still all together. We think that Moleg and Kref made it through, but we still need confirmation on that.” Simulation Pyke grew serious. “Look, are you ready to hear some important stuff ’cos time is running short and you don’t want to be trying to have a whispered conversation under your breath while that skag-muncher Hokajil is still around.”

  Pyke resisted the urge to lean forward. “What do you know about him?”

  “Just that he’s been lying to you—there’s no such thing as a dismantler up on the bridge. Rensik says that going by the pattern of his activities …”

  “Wait, Rensik is in there with you?”

  “Oh yes—he’s been through a few setbacks but he’s on top of his game now. So, Hokajil’s detours, his secret little meetings that you’re not invited to, all suggest that he’s evading Raven’s enemies! Uh-huh: he’s going out of his way to avoid people who might want to help you, the scumsucking gouger, while keeping in touch with Raven’s agents!”

  Pyke leaned back against the padded windowsill, head spinning from what he’d just learned. This Simulation Pyke’s account was wild and crazy and, to be honest, no less crazy and wild than some of the wacked-out berserkery he and the crew had coped with in the last coupla days … Now there was just him, bamboozled into trusting a stranger who had his own agenda. But what would that be? He wants the crystal for himself, so he can do what? Or does he figure he can trade it for something, from someone?

  How do I deal with this? he thought. Fi
ght or escape? But he always has two of his minions bringing up the rear, watching my back!

  “Guess it’s a bit of a tight spot, eh?” said Sim-Pyke. “See that beefy big rifle of yours—was it you that adjusted the fire settings?”

  Pyke remembered Hokajil selecting the thick-bodied rifle from a pile of weapons, and prodding the receiver panel control before handing it over. “I can’t decode these symbols—Hokajil set it up, told me it was set to kill.”

  “I don’t know these symbols eithers,” said Sim-Pyke. “But Rensik does and he says they translate as short beam, wide spread—so, more like ‘set to toast.’ Rensik says, do you want something a bit more useful?”

  “Frackin’ damn right I do!”

  It was an effort to look relaxed while fingering the rifle’s config pad according to the instructions relayed by Sim-Pyke. Then it was done and he closed the pad cover.

  “So,” said Sim-Pyke. “Have you got a plan?”

  “I do have a plan. Kinda.”

  “Well, you’ll have arseholes in front of you, and arseholes behind you so it better have plenty of reckless daring!”

  Pyke couldn’t help grinning. “Stacks of reckless daring and a skagton of hotshot timing!”

  Sim-Pyke’s grin mirrored his own. “Well, o’ course, I’d expect nothing less.” His gaze flicked to one side. “Here comes the chief arsehole now. I’ll be going invisible but I’ll still be watching how it pans out, maybe offer advice if it seems the thing to do. Best of luck, don’t screw it up!”

  Pyke started to frame a reply, or perhaps to tell the other Pyke to look after Dervla, not that she needed it, but the apparition vanished just as he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  “The next stretch is clear,” said Hokajil. “We can move on from here, as long as there are no interruptions on the way.”

  Pyke nodded but Hokajil gave him a look. “Why so glum, Captain? Soon we’ll put an end to the source of your woes and deliver us all back to a world that’s not splintering at the edges.”

  Pyke offered up a wan smile. “Sorry—was just remembering my crew.”

  “I get it, I do. Come on—let’s finish the journey and that demon crystal, then mourn later.”

  He nodded and went after Hokajil as he led the way out of the busy observation lounge. As before, two brought up the rear, the third walked in front of Pyke and Hokajil took point. Pyke cradled the heavy rifle in his arms as he strode on, trying to figure out some kind of workable breakout scheme. There were only two halfway rational options, he decided, one where he waited till they reached a junction with a busy side passage, then call out and wave to someone at the far end then veer off into the crowd, hoping Hokajil’s thugs wouldn’t open fire. The other was to open a door while saying, “Back in a moment” over his shoulder as matter-of-factly as possible, then closing and locking the door behind him. But that would depend on the door being lockable and there being another way out. Apart from those, there was only the shootout option and in a four-on-one setup his odds were on par with a snowball’s chance in Ultrahell.

  But he had to act, no question. His previous theory that Hokajil wanted the crystal for his own schemes had been supplanted by a newer, nastier one, namely that Hokajil was actually angling to make a deal with Raven and/or the Legacy. That would explain why he had not thus far just shot Pyke dead and seized the crystal shard. Pyke was being guarded and kept alive for a reason: to be traded along with the crystal for favours or a stake in whatever devilry the Legacy was planning.

  While these dark and desperate thoughts were winding through his mind, Hokajil’s pathfinding brought them out in a long, oddly deserted corridor.

  “That’s the airgrav-shaft we need,” Hokajil said, pointing. “Takes us straight up to the executive offices just aft of the bridge.” Yet even he frowned as he led them along the vacant passage.

  They’d gone about a dozen paces, maybe half the intervening distance, when a voice, perhaps a woman’s voice, began calling Hokajil’s name from up ahead.

  “Ho-o-k-a-jil! … H-o-o-ka-a-a-j-i-i-l! …”

  Pyke saw Hokajil glance nervously around and mutter, “Crazy bitch!”

  “Hokajil the liar … Hokajil the thief …”

  It was definitely a woman’s voice yet there was no one visible right to the corridor’s end. Still, Hokajil was starting to look distinctly jumpy.

  “You know what happens to thieves and liars, Hokajil? They get what’s coming to them!”

  At once Pyke heard the whine-snap of energy bolts being fired, and he heard it coming from behind. Cursing he flung himself full-length on the corridor floor. As he did so, one of Hokajil’s rearguards made a wet, choking sound, staggered against the wall and left a double smear of blood as he slid down it. The other cried out in pain and fell to the deck, one hand clutching a bloody leg while the other fired a badly aimed salvo back down the corridor. All this happened in a few seconds during which time Pyke had been craning his neck round to get a good look at their attacker, but all he caught was a glimpse of someone in dark garments, someone tall …

  Hokajil was shouting for everyone to take cover, even as the firing ceased, replaced by a tense silence. Hokajil, crouched in the meagre cover of a doorway, sent his third gunman to check the other two—as Pyke suspected, one was dead and the other’s leg needed attention.

  “Who was that?” Pyke said as Hokajil applied a tourniquet to the wounded man’s leg.

  “A deranged ex-follower intent on doing me harm,” Hokajil said, looking sharply at Pyke. “Why didn’t you fire back?”

  “Didn’t have a chance!” Pyke said. “By the time I knew where the firing was coming from it was over.”

  Hokajil was looking stressed. “Okay, okay—let’s get in the grav-shaft and leave this floor behind!”

  With Pyke and the third guard helping the wounded one between them, Hokajil led them quickly to the airgrav-shaft, the time-thrower gripped tightly in his hands, barrel-emitter aimed straight ahead. At the shaft entrance he paused, looked either way then stepped inside. A moment later a figure dropped on him from above, shrieking as Hokajil was knocked down onto the metal-gridded floor. As the attacker flailed at him with some kind of ribbed case, Pyke and the other guard were lowering the wounded man to the floor and reaching for their own weapons … until several more tall, dark figures converged on them, weapons drawn.

  Pyke stared around him in wide-eyed incredulity, stared at the pulse carbines and beam pistols aimed at them and stared at the faces of those doing the aiming. Every single one was the face of Lieutenant-Doctor Ustril. This one had one good eye and a leathery patch over the other; that one was terribly scarred; another had a glowing implant embedded in her forehead; the fourth wore her hair in braids dotted with circuit components. They all regarded him with a burning intensity and they all towered over him. Pyke let go his rifle, allowing it to clatter on the floor, and the third guard followed suit.

  “There, see?” he said. “Now we can all be friends.”

  In the airgrav-shaft, the sounds of a beating had eased, as had the snarling, panting and grunting. The Ustril that was squatting over the insensible form of Hokajil paused and glanced up. Her face was streaked with blood.

  “Friends? This piece of walking refuse once hoodwinked me with that very word, when I was at my weakest and most desperate, plied me with all the right lies, all his well-tuned deceit. I needed the crystal so that I could buy back my life!—which he knew well, the hunger which he used to steer me down into debasement!”

  She swung the case again, and it struck Hokajil’s head with a meaty thud. “My task was to steer Dervla away when the fighting began, subdue her then hand her and the crystal over to Raven then get my …reward.”

  Pyke went cold on hearing the details of this conspiracy. Now he wished he hadn’t surrendered the rifle so willingly.

  “I hope that treachery like yours came at a high price,” he said. “What was your reward, exactly?”

  She got up from the now
unconscious Hokajil and held out the blood-spattered case, tilting it this way and that to show both sides.

  “All that I needed—all three of the fragments of the Essavyr Key. Not the originals, of course, but mirror copies scavenged from the outer facets of the Time-Mosaic, looted from other versions of this ship. Being echoes of reality, Hokajil said, they lacked any special qualities or powers but were otherwise identical …” She shook the case. “Identical …”

  Pyke allowed himself a cold smile. “And when did you find out that you’d been suckered?”

  “I told Hokajil that I was heading for the aft entrance, to take the portal back to the Steel Forest and return to present-day Ong that way. Instead I went up to the bridge itself—it’s the one spot in the wreck where he never used the time-thrower, even though it’s trapped by the cycles of the Time-Mosaic … so I went up there, terrible place, invaded by the Damaugra and its vermin, those cyberlice. Didn’t attract attention, just stepped inside the entrance and opened the case …”

  “I’m guessing it didn’t play a tune,” said Pyke.

  Ustril made no reply, just flipped the catches on the case and let it swing open. Thin black flakes began to trickle out, floating and fluttering, then they surged suddenly, like a torrent of the blackest feathers, which ended up as a bizarre layer of soft black flakes spread out across the width of the corridor. Underfoot, they made a faint crackling sound. “Moving between the time-zones affected their physical state, leaving them like this …”

  “Oh dear,” said Pyke. “Dear, dear, dear—oh, the terrible shame of it …”

  Ustril let the case fall to the floor while her other hand came up, holding a pulse pistol. Pyke heard it hum faintly as she thumbed the safety off.

  “Spare me the juvenile mockery,” she said. “All I need from you is that crystal shard.”