The Apocalypse Codex lf-4

by Charles Stross

  Which means they’ve been penetrated and compromised. By a church?

  RIGHT NOW, MY JOB IS TO HURRY UP AND WAIT. WATCH, MONITOR, and report back to Lockhart; all those things will come in due course. So after I’ve been up for a while I go down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast, after which I head out for a morning constitutional—and, I will admit, to nose around and familiarize myself with the area on foot.

  I am not, at this time, tailed by police cars, monitored by serious-faced G-men in trench coats, or hovered over by black helicopters.

  After an hour or two in an indie bookstore and coffee shop, I head back to my hotel room. It’s neat, sterile, the bed made, and the coffee station resupplied. As I touch the doorknob the ward I left there tells me the only person who has been inside is a Columbian maid called Maria, who is either a tooled-up occult operative from the Black Chamber with a terrifyingly effective line in countermeasure invocations, or exactly what she thinks she is. I go inside, lock the door, sit down in the swivel chair at the desk, and open the book of tats.

  It’s time to go to work.

  My last experience with destiny-entanglement protocols was not, shall we say, a happy one. Anything that involves telepathic bonds with other parties is pretty damned dangerous. If you’ve got a skull full of classified files, the other party you’re forcibly entangled with turns out to be a BLUE HADES/human hybrid succubus working for the Black Chamber, and you’ve got a week to get disentangled before your neural states start to merge, you might develop a slight aversion to the procedure.

  Luckily, this time it’s different. The tats don’t result in a direct merging of minds; but if I close my mind and try to daydream, I find I’m daydreaming myself into someone else’s skull. Try and visualize something else—pink elephants, say—and after a moment I find myself drifting back into the headspace of a dangerous woman trying to play the part of a wealthy ingénue on a religious retreat…

  PERSEPHONE LOOKED AROUND THE CONFERENCE SUITE LOBBY with politely veiled curiosity. Calling it a conference center was a bit of an exaggeration; a timber-fronted motel with an attached car park and a picturesque chapel nestling against a pine-tree-infested hillside, it clearly catered more often to weddings than to business events. On the other hand, the combination of a secluded lodge with an event center and chapel was clearly a good match for Golden Promise Ministries, with the added bonus feature of execrable mobile phone signal—her Blackberry had been showing one bar ever since she arrived, and no data.

  She’d driven up that morning, checked into the lodge with a matched set of Mandarina Duck luggage, and engaged the concierge with a barrage of bubble-headed questions about the facilities. For his part, the concierge humored her: no complaints there. Once in her room she’d taken time to install her extensive wardrobe in the closet, then retired to the bathroom for the best part of an hour. Finally, she sneaked downstairs for lunch—a tuna salad—and across to the event center where the course was due to kick off at three o’clock with an afternoon reception.

  Palmer Lake, Persephone was displeased to learn, lay outside the Golden Promise Ministries’ compound. Her target was at the far end of a private road, beyond a gateway just around the corner of the hill from Pinecrest. In between interrogating the concierge about nearby beauticians and whether the fitness center had an elliptical trainer, she’d pumped him for details: GPM ran these courses regularly, and usually gave participants a guided tour of their ministry on the final day. Not good, she told herself. If they were going to keep her exposure down to a supervised tour, how was she going to plant her spyware? More importantly: What were they trying to keep out of sight?

  The timbered hall was furnished for a talk—a podium at the front and rows of chairs facing it—but there was a buffet spread at the back, with coffee urns and trays piled high with cookies, cake slices, and sushi rolls, as for a corporate motivational junket.

  Aiming to stay in character (a London high-society divorcee or widow, hunting for meaning in an over-privileged, sterile existence), Persephone drifted towards the coffee urn. It was already the focus of some attention by a handful of over-groomed men in office casual and a corresponding gaggle of women who, from their costumes, were desperate not to fade into the invisibility of middle age. As she took in faces, a woman of a very different sort—young and perky, blonde, clipboard-armed and badge-wearing—stepped in front of her. “Can I help you?”

  “I do hope so.” Persephone injected a faint quaver of uncertainty into her voice. “This is the Omega Course reception, isn’t it…?”

  “Sure! My name’s Julie, and I’d just like to take a few details if I may, ma’am? If you wouldn’t mind telling me your name?”

  “Persephone Hazard. Um, this is—”

  “Don’t you worry, Mrs. Hazard, you’re in the right place.” Julie patted her arm, clearly intending reassurance, then scored through a line on her clipboard. Persephone took note, careful not to snoop visibly: from the size of the list they were expecting fewer than thirty people. “From London, I see? Wow, you’ve come a long way today!”

  “I flew in yesterday,” Persephone confided. “There are no direct flights via British Airways so I caught the afternoon shuttle from—”

  Two sentences and Julie began to nod like a metronome; it was amazing how fast most people zoned out if you babbled at them, in Persephone’s experience. (It was all true, easily verifiable—drown ’em in data and they won’t suspect you’re holding out.)

  “Thank you, that’s wonderful,” Julie gushed as soon as Persephone gave her a crevice to lever her way back into the conversation-turned-monologue. “Now I absolutely have to go and take other names? But make yourself right at home! Help yourself to the spread and Ray will be right along in a few minutes to introduce everything. Meanwhile, why don’t you circulate?”

  Persephone nodded and thanked Julie fulsomely, then went about putting her advice into practice. If bonding was the name of the game, then over the next twenty minutes she scored: a property developer called Barry, a local TV anchor called Sylvia, a state senator, and a newly minted partner in a corporate law firm—work that smile!—half the men were divorced or newly upgraded to wife 2.0, so it wasn’t entirely a gold-digger’s paradise, but they were all united by a common factor: the need for something else in their life.

  Persephone was discreetly pumping Senator Martinez about his stance on right-to-work legislation when she felt a sudden change in the atmosphere in the room. Allan Martinez wasn’t looking at her anymore: his gaze tracked over her shoulder, and she turned, following his eyes round towards the doorway. Which was open, to admit Raymond Schiller, beaming, and a couple of assistants—a bald man in smoked glasses and a gray suit, and a homely-faced, middle-aged woman in a blue dress.

  “Hello, everyone!” Schiller called, raising his arms. His suit was immaculately cut, his white shirt worn with a power tie, a small silver cross pinned to his lapel. “Welcome to the Golden Promise! I’m glad you all could make it here today. I mean to make it worth your while. I think this could be the most important meeting of your lives—and by the time we’re through, I’m hoping you’ll find your way to agreeing with me.”

  He clasped his hands together—not in benediction, but in a gesture of defensive self-deprecation. “I want to wish you all a very warm welcome. Some of you may be wondering, ‘Hey, what have I gotten myself into?’” A ripple of nervous laughter spread around the room. “Well, don’t worry. We’re not here to pressure you; you can leave any time you want. This might just not be the right time for you. That’s okay; you can leave whenever you like, and come back whenever you like. Nobody’s going to stop you. It’s a free country.”

  Once started, Schiller kept going for nearly a quarter of an hour, tickling his audience, playing on their nervous curiosity with self-deprecating humor, bringing himself down several pegs until he presented himself as seeing eye-to-eye with them: no longer a mega-famous preacher on a pedestal, but a down-home fellow the men in the a
udience could see themselves sharing a beer with. Persephone nodded along, happily in her element, taking mental notes. There were tricks here, flickers of eye contact, hand gestures designed to manipulate the onlookers’ perceptions. His focus wandered the room, meeting eyes and engaging like a jolt of lightning recognition from the base of the spine. When he spoke to the women his spin was slightly different, less overtly masculine, stressing the mystical; when he spoke to the men his manner became more laconic, less emotionally loaded.

  He’s brilliant, she realized, with a flash of admiration normally reserved for a deadly freak of nature like a black widow spider or a sleeping tiger. He hadn’t even gotten started on the subject of the course—the Omega, humanity’s destiny, the answer to the greatest question, as the promotional pamphlet put it—and he was already establishing himself in his audience’s minds as a trusted guide, an old and reliable friend, leader, and helpmate.

  Ray was good: it went beyond being an inspirational speaker. He had a grip on his audience’s attention span and interests, not just their ears. The talk was more like an afternoon chat show than a sermon. Stomachs full of cake and coffee, heads full of questions, and the audience were nodding along with him enthusiastically rather than nodding off to sleep. Schiller was going to supply the answers—but not until after dinner.

  Persephone leaned back and waited for her opportunity, a vacant smile fixed to her face.

  I BLINK AND OPEN MY EYES. “OW,” I MUMBLE VACANTLY. THE tat on the inside of my left wrist aches and shimmers before my eyes, my bladder’s full, my neck’s stiff and sore, and while I’ve been sitting in this bloody chair the sky has begun to darken in the west. I shake myself and stand up, wobbly from being in one position for too long. Slide time—I must have been experiencing the show in real time with Persephone.

  I’m acutely aware of her self-image, her body feel mapped onto my own—I feel odd, squat and narrow-hipped and dumpy. It’s quite strange; I thank my lucky rabbit’s foot that she’s not having a period. I waddle to the bathroom and empty my bladder, worrying. Am I going to have to do this the whole time? Sixteen hours a day in a chair (hell no, I ought to be in bed) kibitzing on someone else’s sensorium? How about—

  Huh. I completely forgot about Johnny. Should I call him up, too? But not like that; I just need to talk to him, make sure everything’s running to plan. Traviss said I could use the tats to talk. I try to remember the protocol; unlike the straight over-the-shoulder monitoring function, it requires a drop of blood and a minor invocation.

  There is this to be said in favor of posh hotel rooms: they come with handy stuff like an adjustable shaving mirror in the bathroom, a sewing kit (for needles), and most of the stuff you need in order to whomp up a field-expedient summoning grid (class one, minor). I take my time, puttering around for half an hour as I round up the ingredients, jot down a recipe, take the time to step through it in search of fatal errors, jot down a second—this time, non-fatal—version, then execute.

  It’s a good thing I took my time and I’m sitting down because for a moment I can’t see. I know my eyeballs are still where they belong—they haven’t fallen out or anything—but I’m not registering what they’re looking at. Then, with a really uncomfortable mental crunching of gears, I land back in my own head. Except I’m hearing things. Like: ***Wotcher fuck d’you think you’re doing, fuck-head?***

  It’s Johnny. And he’s not terribly happy.

  ***Testing, testing, one, two, three, Peter Pepper picked a—***

  ***Fuck off, son. You trying to cause an accident? Coz I’m on the highway, overtaking…***

  Whoops. ***Sorry.***

  There is a pregnant pause. ***Fuckin’ A.*** A longer pause, synonymous with a sigh. ***Okay, say your piece and get out of my head.***

  ***Update from head office: they say to avoid all contact with law enforcement, especially the FBI.***

  ***No need to teach your grandmother to suck eggs.*** His disgust is palpable. ***Got any other good advice for yer maiden aunt?***

  I rack my brain and apply some spare rusty pilliwinks to my thought processes. ***I’ve been kibitzing on your boss’s session. Trouble is, there’s just the one of me and no shift relief. So I’m going to have to rely on you to alert me if anything goes wrong. Hence the chat.***

  ***Kibitzing—*** I have the most peculiar feeling that he’s rolling his eyes. ***Jesus, son, that’s not clever. The Duchess has a short way with snoops when she finds them: if yer skull’s still intact that’s only ’coz she were distracted. Knock before entering, wipe yer feet on the mat, and wash yer hands on the cat, do I have to draw you a diagram?*** Another pause. ***Anyways. You’re calling ’coz you want me to drop everything and page you if Schiller takes a crap. Right?***

  That draws me up sharp, and I do a double take followed by a brisk self-test. ***No.***

  There is good management and bad management: good management is like air—you don’t know it’s there until it’s gone away. Looking at the back of my head, I have a feeling I’m not being a good manager right now. So I take a deep breath and try to explain myself: ***I’m hanging out alone, in an information vacuum, and it’s doing my head in, so I’m acting out. Right now I have no idea what you two are planning or what you expect me to do if things go adrift and you two have to cut and run. Or if there’s any support you need.***

  There’s a long silence. ***Like that, huh?*** He sounds thoughtful. ***Okay, Howard. It’s like this: you don’t know where I am because I don’t want you to know where I am. And we haven’t asked you for any support yet. And if we have to run, you’ll know about it. Like this.*** I scream and clutch my upper right arm. Bastard feels like he’s twisting it between his hands—not hard, but he got the scar that Jonquil left in it last year. ***If you get that, it means you want to leave town now, do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred kilos of China White, because everything has gone to fuck. Got that?***

  ***Jesus,*** I mutter verbally. ***I get the message. But use the other arm, please.***

  ***Any particular reason?***

  ***No.*** I might just be a bit snippy right now. My eyes are certainly watering. ***Just do it. In case I’m pointing a gun at someone.***

  ***You and guns don’t mix, unless I mistake my man.*** The bastard sounds amused.

  He’s not as right as he thinks he is, but I pass. ***Next. I gather the course is outside the GPM compound, so your boss is looking for a way to get in and plant her bug. Which is fine, if she can do it—but I don’t want her to take any unnecessary risks. Put it this way, I don’t think it’s worth her life. If she can’t get in, we’ll figure out what to do later. But I want you to get that message across, because I’ve got a feeling if I tell her directly she’ll take it as a challenge. Am I right?***

  Silence. Followed by more silence. Finally he says, ***You’re not wrong.*** For a moment my vision fuzzes again, almost as if he’s decided to drop the mental firewall. But no: ***I don’t reckon she’ll take that from me, either. But she’s not stupid, son. Sit back, stay out of our hair, and I’ll feed you updates when it’s safe.***

  ***Okay.***

  ***Okay,*** he says, and there’s an empty moment that feels like I’ve just been punched in the head, minus the pain—then I’m staring at a cracked mirror and clutching my right bicep, which is aching like a pulled molar.

  This management gig isn’t as easy as it looks at first sight, is it?

  I ORDER UP DINNER ON ROOM SERVICE, WATCH A SHITTY COMEDY on the in-room TV channel, then hit up the minibar for a half bottle of wine. Drinking on my own is a bad idea but I manage to keep to just the one serving, and anyway, going out and looking to get drunk in company is an even worse prospect under the circumstances. I am not merely stranded in hotelspace, I am adrift in hoteltime in my very own personal air-conditioned TARDIS. Eventually I drift off to sleep, at first to dream of burning goats checking my time sheet for accounting errors, and then—

  Oh shit, is my first reflexive thought as I wake
up inside a dream: I’ve been here before, and I didn’t like it the first time.

  I’m in a dream, and in this dream I am awake, and I am immobilized, and I am very, very thirsty for something other than water.

  Above me the sky is dark from horizon to horizon, dark but not black: a gossamer streamer of varicolored dust clouds splashes across the night like a Thuggee strangler’s silk scarf. The starscape itself is crammed with the red and dying stellar wreckage of a prematurely aged galactic core. Below the horizon I can sense the dying sun, bulbous and red, choking on the corpses of its planetary children. But not this world. The moons—plural—have set, but the dim radiance of the nebula overhead casts long shadows across the parched plateau and the Watchers and the Pyramid.

  The Pyramid.

  I’m one of the Watchers—or rather, I’m a passive, helpless passenger inside the skull of one of the dead, mummified Watchers who the Bloody White Baron impaled in a huge circle on the dying plain nearly a century ago, to form a ring of human sacrificial guards around the Pyramid. The Baron, himself a figure out of nightmares and a necromancer of no small talent, had nightmares of his own about the thing that sleeps in the Pyramid: the Opener of the Ways, some call it. The sleepers are quantum observers, eyeless and dead but still alive, condemned to collapse the wave function of the thing in the mile-high tomb so that it is forever asleep—

  (Because if the Watch on the Pyramid fails the Black Bird of Hangar 12B will fly its one-way mission, the last forlorn hope of the British strategic nuclear deterrent, and then all hell will literally break loose.)

  —Why am I here?

  I am, it occurs to me, having a lucid dream. Which is an utterly horrible experience when you wake up inside an impaled, mummified corpse propped up on a stainless steel spike in front of a geometric shape that makes your imaginary insides curdle with terror. I’d pinch myself if I could move the withered, blackened claws I have instead of hands. The peripheral nerves of this body have shriveled and decayed along with its flesh, but I can still feel the other Watchers to either side of me. Indignant and hungry and incoherent with rage and grief and the shattering of life’s dream, they recognize the presence of a not-dead soul and lust to eat my identity, to pour my waters into the drained pool of their deaths—