Neutronium Alchemist - Conflict nd-4

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Above her, the dome’s blocks capped the chamber. Except from inside they were transparent; she could see the geometric reticulation quite plainly.

  All in all, Malva’s home was interesting rather than revelational. Nothing here human technology and bitek couldn’t reproduce with a bit of effort and plenty of money. Presumably it had been selected to put Confederation visitors at ease, or damp down their greed for high-technology gadgets.

  Malva eased herself down on one of the benches. Please be seated. I anticipate you will require physical comfort for this session.

  Syrinx selected a seat opposite her host. It allowed her to see some small grey patches on Malva’s snowy hide, so pale they could have been a trick of the light. Did grey indicate aging in all creatures? You are very gracious. Did Ambassador Pyrus indicate the information I would ask for?

  No. But given the trouble which now afflicts your race, I expect it is of some portent.

  Yes. I was sent by the founder of our culture, Wing-Tsit Chong. We both appreciate you cannot tell me how we can rid ourselves of the possessed. However, he is curious about many aspects of the phenomenon.

  This ancestor of yours is an entity of some vision. It is my regret I never encountered him.

  You would be most welcome to visit Jupiter and talk to him.

  There would be little point; to us a memory construct is not the entity, no matter how sophisticated the simulacrum.

  Ah. That was my first question: Have the souls of Edenists transferred into the neural strata of our habitats along with their memories?

  Is this not obvious to you yet? There is a difference between life and memory. Memory is only one component which comprises a corporeal life. Life begets souls, they are the pattern which sentience and self-awareness exerts on the energy within the biological body. Very literally: you think, therefore you are.

  Life and memory, then, are separate but still one?

  While the entity remains corporeal, yes.

  So a habitat would have its own soul?

  Of course.

  So voidhawks have as well.

  They are closer to you than your habitats.

  How wonderful, Oenone said. Death will not part us, Syrinx. It has never parted captains and ships.

  A smile rose to her face, buoyed by the euphoria of the voidhawk’s thoughts. I never expected it to, my love. You were always a part of me.

  And you I,it replied adoringly.

  Thank you,syrinx told malva. Do you require payment for this information?

  Information is payment. Your questions are informative.

  You are studying us, aren’t you?

  All of life is an opportunity to study.

  I thought so. But why? You gave up star travel. That must be the ultimate way to experience, to satisfy a curious mind. Why show an interest in an alien race now?

  Because you are here, Syrinx.

  I don’t understand.

  Explain the human urge to gamble, to place your earned wealth on the random tumble of a dice. Explain the human urge to constantly drink a chemical which degrades your thought processes.

  I’m sorry,she said, contrite at the gentle chide.

  Much we share. Much we do not.

  That’s what puzzles myself and Wing-Tsit Chong. You are not that different from us; ownership of knowledge doesn’t alter the way the universe ultimately works. Why then should this prevent you from telling us how to combat the possessed?

  The same facts do not bring about the same understanding. This is so even between humans. Who can speak of the gulf between races?

  You faced this knowledge, and you survived.

  Logic becomes you.

  Is that why you gave up starflight? Do you just wait to die knowing it isn’t the end?

  Laton spoke only the truth when he told you that death remains difficult. No sentient entity welcomes this event. Instinct repels you, and for good reason.

  What reason?

  Do you embrace the prospect of waiting in the beyond for the universe to end?

  No. Is that what happens to Kiint souls, too?

  The beyond awaits all of us.

  And you’ve always known that. How can you stand such knowledge? It is driving humans to despair.

  Fear is often the companion of truth. This too is something you must face in your own way.

  Laton also called death the start of the great journey. Was he being truthful then as well?

  It is a description which could well apply.

  Syrinx glanced over to Ruben for help, not daring to use the singular engagement mode. She felt she was making progress, of sorts, even if she wasn’t sure where it was leading—though some small traitor part of her mind resented learning that Laton hadn’t lied.

  Do you know of other races which have discovered the beyond?ruben asked.

  Most do.there was a tinge of sadness in malva’s thoughts.

  How? Why does this breakthrough occur?

  There can be many reasons.

  Do you know what caused this one?

  No. Though we do not believe it to be entirely spontaneous. It may have been an accident. If so, it would not be the first time.

  You mean it wasn’t supposed to happen?

  The universe is not that ordered. What happens, happens.

  Did these other races who found the beyond all triumph like the Kiint?

  Triumph is not the object of such an encounter.

  What is?

  Have you learned nothing? I cannot speak for you, Ruben.

  You deal with many humans, Malva,syrinx said. You know us well. Do you believe we can resolve this crisis?

  How much faith do you have in yourself, Syrinx?

  I’m not sure, not anymore.

  Then I am not sure of the resolution.

  But it is possible for us.

  Of course. Every race resolves this moment in its history.

  Successfully?

  Please, Syrinx. There are only differing degrees of resolution. Surely you have realized this of all subjects cannot be a realm of absolutes.

  Why won’t you tell us how to begin resolving the crisis? I know we are not so different. Couldn’t we adapt your solution? Surely your philosophy must allow you some leeway, or would helping us negate the solution entirely?

  It is not that we cannot tell you how we dealt with the knowledge, Syrinx. If it would help, then of course we would; to do otherwise would be the infliction of cruelty. No rational sentient would condone that. We cannot advise you because the answer to the nature of the universe is different for each sentient race. This answer lies within yourselves, therefore you alone can search for it.

  Surely a small hint—

  You persist in referring to the answer as a solution. This is incorrect. Your thoughts are confined within the arena of your psychosocial development. Your racial youth and technological dependence blinds you. As a result, you look for a quick-fix in everything, even this.

  Very well. What should we be looking for?

  Your destiny.

  • • •

  The hold-down latches locked the Tantu into the docking cradle, producing a mechanical grinding. Quinn didn’t like the sound, it was too final, metal fingers grasping at the base of the starship, preventing it from leaving unless the spaceport crew granted permission.

  Which, he told himself, they would. Eventually.

  It had taken Twelve-T almost a week to organize his side of the deal. After several broken deadlines and threats and high-velocity abuse, the necessary details had finally been datavised to the Tantu , and they’d flown down to Jesup, an asteroid owned by the government of New Georgia. The flight plan they’d filed with Nyvan’s traffic control was for a cryogenic resupply, endorsed and confirmed by the Iowell Service & Engineering Company who had won the contract. As the fuel transfer didn’t require the Tantu ’s crew to disembark, there was no requirement for local security forces to check for signs of possession. The whole routine operation could be h
andled by Iowell’s personnel.

  When the docking cradle had lowered the frigate into the bay, an airlock tube wormed its way out of the dull metal wall to engage the starship’s hatch. Quinn and Graper waited in the lower deck for the environmental circuit to be established.

  The next five minutes, Quinn knew, were going to be crucial. He was going to have to use the encounter to establish his control over Twelve-T, while the gang lord would undoubtedly be seeking to assert his superiority at the same time. And although he didn’t know it, Twelve-T had a numerical advantage. Quinn guessed there would be a troop of gang soldiers on the other side of the hatch, congested with weapons and hyped-on attitude. It’s what he would have done.

  What I need, he thought, is the kind of speed which boosting gives the military types. He felt the energistic power shifting inside his body, churning through his muscles to comply with his wishes. Light panels in the airlock chamber began to flicker uncertainly as his robe shrank around his body, eradicating any fabric which could catch against obstructions.

  A cold joy of anticipation seeped up within his mind as he prepared to unleash his serpent beast on the waiting foe. For so long now he had been forced to restrain himself. It would be good to advance the work of God’s Brother again, to watch pride shatter beneath cruelty.

  Twelve-T waited nervously in the docking bay’s reception chamber as the airlock pressurized. His people were spread around the dilapidated chamber, wedged behind tarnished support ribs, sheltered by bulky, broken-down cubes of equipment. All of them covered the ash-grey circular carbotanium hatch with their weapons, sensors focused and fire-control programs switched to millisecond response triggers.

  That shit Quinn might have raged about the delays, but Twelve-T knew he’d put together a slick operation. This whole deal needed the master’s touch. A fucking frigate, for shit’s sake! He’d busted his balls arranging for the starship to dock without the cops realizing what was going down. But then the gang had interests all over New Georgia, half their money came from legitimate businesses. Companies like Iowell—a small operation established decades ago—were easy to muscle in on. The spaceport crew did as the union told them, managers could be persuaded to take their cut.

  Getting his soldiers up to Jesup had been a bitch, too. Like him, they all had the gang’s distinctive silver skull; skin from their eyebrows back to the nape of the neck had been replaced by a smooth cap of chrome flexalloy. Metal and composite body parts were worn like medals, showing how much damage you’d taken for the gang.

  Try slipping twenty of them into Jesup without the administration cops taking an interest.

  But he’d done it. And now he was going to find out just what the fuck was really going on. Because sure as turds floated to the top, Quinn Dexter wasn’t on the level.

  The instrument panel beside the hatch let out a weak bleep.

  “It’s ready,” Lucky Vin datavised. “Shit, Twelve-T, I can’t get anything from the sensors in the tube. They’ve crashed.”

  “Quinn do that, man?”

  “I ain’t too sure. This place . . . it ain’t the maintenance hotspot of the galaxy, you know.”

  “Okay. Pop the hatch.” He opened the datavise to include the rest of his soldiers. “Sharpen up, people, this is it.”

  The hatch seal disengaged, allowing the actuators to hinge it back. Absolute blackness filled the airlock tube.

  Twelve-T craned his neck forwards, scar tissue stretching tightly. Even with his retinal implants switched to infrared there was nothing to see in the tube. “Screw this—”

  The blackness at the centre of the tube bulged out, a bulbous cone devouring the chamber’s photons. Five maser carbines and a TIP pistol fired, skewering the anti-light chimera from every direction. It broke open, petals of night peeling apart from the centre to splash against the chamber walls.

  Twelve-T’s neural nanonics began to crash. Blocks clipped to his belt chased them into electronic oblivion. The last datavise he received was from his maser carbine, telling him the power cells were dropping out. He tried to grasp the ten-millimetre machine gun velcroed to his hip, only to find his arm shuddering; the pistonlike actuators he’d replaced the forearm muscles with were seizing up.

  A missile composed of tightly whorled shadow swelled up out of the centre of the flowering blackness. Too fast for the eye to follow in real-time—certainly as far as Twelve-T’s faltering retinal implants were concerned—it shot across the chamber and bounced.

  The first scream clogged the chamber’s air. One of the soldiers was crumpling up, his body imploding in a series of rapid strikes. He seemed to be dimming, as if he were caught at the middle of a murky nebula. Then his head caved in, and it was blood not the sounds of agony that went spraying across the chamber.

  A second soldier convulsed, as if she were trying to jam her head down towards her buttocks. She managed a single bewildered grunt before her spine snapped.

  The third victim darkened, his clothes starting to smoulder. Both of his titanium hands turned cherry-red, glowing brightly. When he opened his mouth to scream a column of pink steam puffed out.

  Twelve-T had it worked out by then. There was always a translucent cloud around the soldiers as they were slaughtered, a grey shadow that flickered at subliminal speed. His disabled arm levered the machine gun off the velcro, and he turned desperately towards the source of the latest screams. His soldiers were losing it, flinging themselves at the exit hatch, wrestling with each other in their struggle to escape.

  The light panels were turning a dark tangerine and beginning to sputter; black iron grids had materialized across them, growing thicker. Oily smoke began to pour forth. The fractured buzzing sound of the conditioning fans was dying away. Globules of blood oscillated through the air, fringes rippling like restive jellyfish. Twelve-T knew then he’d been fucked. It wasn’t Quinn Dexter, rat boy from the arcologies. This was the worst it could possibly get.

  He’d never liked Nyvan. But what the fuck, it was his home planet. Now the possessed were going to violate it, subdue every living body. And he was the total fucking asshole who’d let them in.

  Another of his soldiers was being chopped apart, haloed in quivering dusk. Pure fury powered Twelve-T’s malfunctioning body into a final act of obedience. He swung the machine gun around on the macerated soldier and squeezed back on the trigger. It was only a short burst. A blue flame spat out of the muzzle to the accompaniment of a thunderous roar. Without a neural nanonics operational procedure program to help him, the recoil was far more powerful than he expected. His shoes were ripped free of the stikpad, and he was somersaulting backwards through the air, hollering in surprise.

  The universe paused.

  “Shatter!” a furious voice bellowed.

  The machine gun obeyed, its cool silicolithium fragmenting like a shrapnel grenade. Needle slivers sliced deep into Twelve-T’s flesh, some ricochetting off the metal casings of his replacement parts. He was flailing wildly now, trailing fantails of blood from his shredded hand.

  “Hold him,” someone instructed curtly.

  Quinn slowed himself back from the speedstate, energistic currents sinking down to quiescent levels. As they did, the rest of the world began to accelerate. It had been awesome, moving through an airlock chamber populated by statues, time solidified to a single heartbeat. Their time, not his. God’s Brother had granted him impunity from the actions of any non-possessed. What greater sign that he was indeed the chosen one?

  “Thank you, my Lord,” he whispered, humbled. Planets would truly bow before him now; just as Lawrence had prophesied.

  Most of the blood had impacted on a surface, splattering wide into big smears and sticking tenaciously. Grotesque corpses drifted peacefully in the warm air streams. The remnants of the gang were in a sorry state. With four possessed in the airlock chamber and pulsing with malevolent power, their artificial body parts had either frozen or were running out of control. And they were all combat vets, heavily dependent on re
placements, almost up to cosmonik level. Lawrence and Graper were plucking weapons from unresisting hands, claws, and wrist sockets.

  Quinn kicked off towards Twelve-T. His robe resumed its usual extravagant cut as he glided across the compartment.

  Twelve-T was sweating heavily. One of the soldiers whose arms were mostly the original organic was bandaging the gang lord’s ruined hands with strips torn from his own T-shirt.

  “I admire your strength,” Quinn said. “It can be harnessed to serve God’s Brother.”

  “Ain’t no God, can’t have no fucking—” Pain gripped his left arm, forcing him to cry out. His skin hissed as it rose in huge blisters.

  “You wanted to irritate me,” Quinn said mildly.

  Twelve-T glowered helplessly. He wasn’t used to so much pain, none of them were. Neural nanonics always protected them. That meant it was going to get bad, he realized, real bad. Unless . . .

  “And I won’t allow you to suicide,” Quinn said. “I know that’s what you were thinking. Everybody does when they grab what’s gonna happen.”

  The strips of cloth bandaging Twelve-T’s hands hardened into shiny nylon. Their ends flexed up like blind snakes, then slowly knotted together.

  “You’re so close to me, Twelve-T,” Quinn said earnestly. “Your serpent beast is almost free. You would never have become what you are without realizing what your true nature is. Don’t hold back, embrace God’s Brother. Live in the Night with us.”

  “You’ll make a mistake, asshole. And I’ll be around waiting for it.”

  “I don’t make mistakes. I am the chosen one.”

  “Holy fuck.”

  “Follow me, Twelve-T. Submit to your true self and know the glory of His word. Betray your people for greed and profit. That way you will never know defeat again. My disciples fuck who they want when they want. They see their enemies burn in torment. Enjoy rewards you have never dared take before. Help me, Twelve-T. Tell me where the asteroid cops are. Shunt your gang’s money into my credit disk. Show me where the spaceplanes are that can take my disciples down to the surface. Do it, Twelve-T.”