The Soldier

by Neal Asher

  —Notes from her lecture “Modern Warfare” by E. B. S. Heinlein

  ORLANDINE

  The accretion disc sat quiet while work on the defence platform orbiting Jaskor was being completed at a satisfactory pace. Work on Orlandine’s special project, the two runcibles, still continued but would stall in a few days due to lack of vital components and materials. Knobbler and the other drones there were not happy about this but grudgingly accepted that the platform had priority. In essence, and considering the circumstances, all was as it should be, but Orlandine could not settle back into the work that had occupied her for decades.

  “I’m bored,” said Cutter from the living quarters of her ship.

  “It’s your age,” Bludgeon replied, perfectly happy plugged into the ship’s computing and studying defence-platform technical stats.

  Cutter grunted in annoyance. Via internal cams, Orlandine watched him moving about in the living area. Abruptly he halted and slumped.

  “I think . . . I’ll . . . step past . . . this,” he said.

  It wasn’t really sleep he was dropping into. He was using the drone technique of altering his perception of time. Now hours would pass like seconds for him, or even microseconds. Orlandine envied him, wanting time to pass and events to react to, but somehow she could not take the same step. Was this a result of her antecedents? She had been gestated in a womb and born of a human mother, while Cutter had been assembled on a production line in a war factory.

  Why did she also feel so ill at ease? The frustrating explanation from Dragon was part of it, but she also had a certainty that something was happening. This feeling definitely arose from her human component but seemed to be confirmed by an untraceable source within another element of her being: the Jain technology that bound her human self to her Polity AI crystal. Was it perhaps the case that, just as the Jain tech in the accretion disc responded to the hidden Jain AIs, she possessed some connection to that technology in general? Did it share a kind of group subconscious? This was possible. Though she had conquered the technology of one Jain node and turned it to her will, it had levels of function that extended into the sub-nano-scopic world beyond her control and perception. When, finally, a request for contact came from an unexpected source, she felt relief, as if events were again moving towards some conclusion.

  “It’s been a long time,” she said, opening the connection. She gazed mentally, with deep fascination, at the transmitted image.

  “Five of your human years, I believe,” replied the other.

  “I never had a chance to thank you for the metallurgist,” she said, “and for the two cubic miles of prador armour sheeting. And for all the rest.”

  “And I thank you for allowing the enclave on Jaskor,” replied the other.

  “It’s an embassy only. Your prador there don’t get to do much.”

  “Nevertheless, it is a presence and delivers the message to the Polity AIs that the defence sphere is not theirs. Our interests are the same in this respect,” replied the other. “I prefer to deal with you because you are independent and I would find it distasteful dealing directly with Polity AIs. You are sufficiently grey.”

  “Why, thank you, my . . .” Orlandine hesitated with the title.

  “Call me Oberon,” the king of the prador interjected. “The course of history runs smooth and I have sufficient respect for the one who said I would give myself this name to comply. Perhaps I have also acquired something in the way of superstition. If I diverge from my planned course then maybe I invite catastrophe—like the potential one you sit on at that accretion disc.”

  The king of the prador had changed only slightly in the last five years. However, his prador form had altered considerably since he had seized control of the Kingdom. The Spatterjay virus had this strange effect on these alien crustaceans. He was much bigger than a prador adult and his body had stretched out so he now resembled some sort of giant, long-legged louse. Red demonic eyes gleamed to his fore over a complicated set-up of mandibles that looked more like something found on an autodoc than on a predator such as him. And even over the link, with the knowledge that he was light years away, Orlandine found something dangerously sinister about him.

  “What can I do for you?” she asked.

  “Events have occurred that directly relate to your self-assumed mission,” Oberon replied. “Some information has become available concerning the entity Erebus, who made use of Jain technology acquired from the accretion disc, and who may have activated its present activity there.”

  “Information?” Orlandine repeated, waiting.

  “A legate, in control of a wormship, went to the world of the Cyberat.”

  Orlandine felt a thrill run down the data sockets in her sides. It wasn’t exactly fear, nor was it surprise. Analysing it, she could only describe it as a feeling of being “back in the game.”

  “A legate and a wormship survived Erebus’s suicide?”

  “Just so.”

  Orlandine decided to ignore the questions that clamoured in her mind. “Continue.”

  “On that world is a Cyberat called Zackander who possesses many items of Jain technology. It seems likely the legate was there in this regard. At the time, it so happens my agents were there too.”

  “Doubtless ensuring those items would fall into the right . . . claws?”

  “It was necessary to have a presence there,” Oberon equivocated. “Another embassy, if you like.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Yes, my agents had struck a deal with Zackander for some exchanges. Their payment was protection which, upon the arrival of this wormship, Zackander collected on.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Orlandine. “These agents—what were they packing?”

  “Two destroyers.”

  “Not enough.”

  “Somewhat more advanced than usual.” “Still . . .”

  “No, you are correct, one of the destroyers was itself destroyed.”

  “And you allowed this?”

  “The data were more important.”

  Orlandine let that go. Polity AIs were quite prepared to sacrifice lives if it facilitated the collection of data vital to the survival of the Polity. She should be less surprised by the same ruthlessness from the king of the prador.

  “What data?”

  “A great deal,” said the king. “The wormship, without the legate aboard, fought intelligently—it behaved beyond the expectations of something without a guiding mind. It U-jumped during the fight and it also deployed a U-jump missile.”

  “The legate was linked.”

  “No, too much disruption.”

  “You are supposing the legate was the only passenger?”

  “You have the crux of the matter.”

  “There is more?”

  “Yes. My remaining destroyer was attacked by a fragment which the wormship shed of itself. Jain sequestering abilities were indicated.”

  This was fascinating. Much of what Erebus had controlled, like its wormships, had been complicated items that were a by-blow of Jain and Polity technology. Only when specifically made to do so were they able to sequester, spreading and destroying in the way that Jain technology did. The contention amidst Polity AIs was that Erebus used Jain technology but did not wholly incorporate it—that it took only what it required and avoided the trap. This was Orlandine’s contention too, because that was precisely what she had done.

  “You have detail?” she asked.

  “This interests you?”

  “It does.”

  “I will send you coordinates for the destroyer and a method of making contact.”

  “Wait, I don’t under—”

  The king was gone; the comlink cut. Orlandine cursed. Did he expect her to just drop everything and run to do his bidding? What the hell was it he wanted anyway? She studied the package he had sent just before closing the link. It contained a wealth of detail on the legate and some analysis of how it might have survived the destruction of Erebus, as well as sp
eculation on its present goals. She took all this apart rapidly and studied it intently. She then turned to other data on the Cyberat, with their de facto ruler, this Zackander, and his collection of Jain artefacts. The detail on that, she realized, was what Oberon’s agents had exchanged their services for. She felt another visceral thrill.

  The Jain tech, interlaced throughout her body and apparently under her control, responded on some deep level to these items, and to one in particular. Perhaps she was right, perhaps she did sample from some kind of communal subconscious. She checked linked files and found deeper scan data on the object, studying the intricate internal structure. Her knowledge of Jain tech was such that she quickly understood that this thing was a storage device for organic matter, while from her deeper self, there rose a response to extreme danger. The genetic code of one of the Jain themselves, perhaps? Whatever it was, she was certain this was the item the legate had gone to the Cyberat world for.

  What should she do?

  Dragon.

  Even as the thought occurred to her she made contact with the entity, sitting out there in vacuum, where it had assumed the position of the missing Weapons Platform Mu in the accretion disc defence sphere.

  “Look at this,” she stated, and rather than get into any discussion, she just transmitted a recording of everything that had passed from the moment Oberon had contacted her.

  “Go,” Dragon replied, just seconds later.

  “As simple as that?” she asked.

  “Resolution will come from data, from knowledge,” Dragon replied. “Traps lie in our path.”

  “Maybe we have found this other agency you mentioned?”

  “Or results of its actions.”

  “This legate is the other agency?”

  “I doubt it,” Dragon replied.

  She considered probing further but was reluctant. She understood that she would get no more from Dragon, and must comprehend fully herself. She lay in her interface sphere contemplating the purpose of her life now. Jain tech had been the enemy and she had helped destroy a breakout of it instigated by the rogue AI Erebus. Later recruited by Dragon, her new goal was to prevent further breakouts of the technology from the accretion disc, and finally to eliminate the threat. But these were specific purposes. Her general aim was always to counter the threat this technology posed. And a legate, running around in a wormship, hunting down items of Jain tech that her inner self warned her were more dangerous than the usual kind (merely capable of destroying civilizations), must be lethal indeed.

  She had to get involved, there was no doubt.

  “So we go?” enquired Bludgeon.

  She’d been aware that through her system the drone had been a silent watcher, but hadn’t minded—she trusted all the drones from the war runcible absolutely.

  “We go,” she replied.

  EARTH CENTRAL

  Earth Central stepped into the virtuality bearing the form of a thin-faced young haiman with blond hair plaited close to his skull, and a tough wiry physique. Interface plugs were behind each ear and running like a line of nacreous scales from the base of his skull down his spine, with other support hardware scattered around his body. EC reviewed his appearance for a moment, and decided against the ersatz Jacobean clothing this form had once worn. He clad himself in a simple environment suit, then began to fill in his surroundings over the white plain and sky.

  The panoramic viewing window of a spaceship drew across, sunlight glaring in and the titanic construction blocks of a Dyson sphere silhouetted against it. Other items shifted out there: giant constructor ships, robots capable of shaping asteroids and vast pseudo-matter scaffolds gridded across hundreds of thousands of miles of vacuum. All was ready and it had taken less than a microsecond—time enough for the visitor to take her precautions before entering the virtuality.

  “Shoala,” said a voice, “a crass appeal to my conscience, perhaps?” EC turned.

  Orlandine had chosen to present herself in her current form. Her skin was the colour of coffee and her head bald. A skin-tight shipsuit clung to her curves and her eyes were blue, with a hint of metal in them.

  “It is always worth reminding you,” replied EC.

  “Do you think me capable of forgetting the man I murdered?” she asked. “But I refuse to feel guilt any more—I was a different person then.” She gazed at the view. “The Cassius Project . . . how goes it there now?”

  “Haimen and AIs continue to build the Dyson sphere—projections have improved now and it seems likely it will be completed in eighty thousand years.”

  Orlandine nodded. “You could have chosen a better view.”

  Earth Central felt a moment of annoyance. This wasn’t going as it had expected. With a thought, it changed the view. Now fragments of a cosmic egg floated in gas clouds, lit from within. The Cassius gas giant, in its own orbit close around the sun, supplied those clouds, while carefully positioned anti-matter blasts slowly took it apart. Some of the egg-shell fragments were a hundred thousand miles across. Matter converters the size of small moons crawled at their edges, sucking in the debris of the gas giant’s destruction and slowly laying it down as a mile-thick composite laced with a balancing web of grav-motors and superconducting cables.

  “Beautiful,” said Orlandine and swung round to gaze at EC. “The king of the prador has passed on to me something of interest. I felt beholden, considering how I sit precariously between two powers, to inform you. However, I see that I have no need of doing so.”

  How did she do that? How could she know?

  “You are a datavore, EC, and just like the king, and like Dragon, you like to push things together to see what further information arises,” she said.

  It was as if she could read his mind.

  “I was aware that the king might be calling on your services,” said EC. “I have not been apprised of the detail.”

  Rather than reply verbally, she sent a data package. EC studied it briefly. “A wormship fragment showing the ability to sequester . . . You are en route?”

  “I am en route.”

  “And Dragon?”

  “Remains at the accretion disc temporarily replacing the weapons platform it mislaid.” Orlandine stood perfectly still for a moment, but for that metallic movement in her eyes. “You see connections.”

  “I always see connections.”

  She nodded. “What further information do you require?” “I would like regular updates on your progress when you reach this destroyer.”

  “Very well, so we are done talking for now.”

  “There is one further point . . .”

  “Yes?”

  “It is only fair to warn you that the king may, sometime soon, become less cooperative. The weapons platform you lost may well turn up in the Kingdom. Proceed with caution.”

  “The Client seeking vengeance?”

  EC considered a truthful reply, but then decided on a half-truth. It was unsure what she knew and always felt better in these situations not revealing too much to someone it doubted. “Yes, probably.”

  Orlandine nodded and shimmered out of existence.

  Earth Central gazed at the spot she had occupied then returned its attention to the panorama. It changed now, showing an enhanced view into a system consisting of a red dwarf orbiting a neutron star. It was all sitting in a mass of fragments that had once been the planetary system of the red dwarf, before the neutron star arrived. This system had a bright star in its firmament—the accretion disc was not so far away in interstellar terms. EC focused in on the fleet of ships concealed amidst the fragments. Two hundred modern destroyers hung like giant sarcophagi expelled from some vast vacuum burial ship. A thousand attack ships, black as coal, were a swirling shoal of hunting garfish. The giant lozenges of standard dreadnoughts drifted, limiting output that might be detected. While other behemoths pretended to be moons set loose.

  EC blinked and the view changed again.

  The prador watch station vaguely bore the shape of a pyramid mount
ed on top of a cylinder and was ten miles from top to bottom. In its shadow, reavers waited—three hundred of them at last count. No attempt had been made at concealment here, so EC wondered if there was something else being hidden. Whatever. These ships lay the same distance from the accretion disc as the Polity fleet did. It was good to be prepared, as both EC and the king were. It would be preferable, however, if none of the gathered ships needed to be deployed. If they were, Earth Central had no doubt that things would get messy.

  ANGEL

  Angel looked upwards and saw meteors in the day-lit sky as debris from the battle there began to hit atmosphere. He closed his eyes and dampened his scanning of the immediate surroundings so that he could make a firmer link with his wormship. The soldier had annihilated the Cube and all the Cyberat in its vicinity but, thankfully, did not seem in any great hurry to return. The worms he had sent it were now self-assembling in its mind, and Angel could, through them, see some of what the soldier was doing. It was running through, and incorporating at an astonishing rate, all the data it had taken. Angel surmised that the soldier had realized the Cube and the Cyberat were not a threat that needed to be destroyed straight away, contrary to its first calculations. Instead it had gathered data while occupying them with a viral attack on their systems, and then had finally killed them.