The Machinery of Light ar-3

by David J. Williams

  And they do. Fast. It’s all Linehan can do to keep up—all he can do to stay sane as apparitions loom before him and spirits gibber at him—hollow-eyed ghosts staring straight through the barrier that Haskell’s slung up around him, pressing against his head. It’s like those things are pounding against his skull, trying to break in—like all of reality’s boiling inside his head. When it boils away maybe he’ll see straight through to what’s been hidden from him all this time. He grits his teeth, follows this woman-who’s-no-woman as she keeps on driving forward—

  What the fuck are we dealing with, Carson?”

  Lynx’s voice sounds as on edge as the Operative has ever heard—the voice of a man grasping for something to hold on to and falling way too short. The Operative is almost tempted to just let Lynx stew. But he can’t be sure he won’t be going there himself any moment now. So he lets himself just describe.

  “Sinclair’s got a psychic moat,” he says. “Something that no normal mind could pass.”

  “Not too many abnormal ones either,” says Lynx.

  Nor is the mind enough. Reflexes are at a premium as well. Maschler, Riley, Linehan, Lynx, the Operative, Velasquez, and the other two members of her triad—they’re all following the instructions that Haskell’s flashing to them, following her as she forges forward—

  It’s a little easier because she’s been this way before. The only way to get in or out of the Room without using a teleporter—but the labyrinth’s geometry is unreliable. It shifts every time one passes through it, is never the same thing twice. She figures that’s fitting—she gets a glimpse of Sinclair as a minotaur lurking in the catacombs of eternity, of herself as Theseus threading the final maze toward him. She senses more emanations foaming in from the Room, senses something new—

  And when we get there?” asks Sarmax.

  “We do whatever she says,” says Velasquez.

  “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “What makes you think I’m not telling you something?”

  Long experience. He’s considering all the angles as the maelstrom of the labyrinth whirls around them; he’s realizing that she’s playing at something, and he’s not sure he can stand to know—not sure that Haskell doesn’t know already—

  “Control yourself,” hisses Velasquez, “or she will.”

  “Our minds—”

  “Your mind is under my protection. And mine is the only one that this superbitch can’t penetrate.”

  “This superbitch is the only thing that can stop Matthew Sinclair—”

  “She’s playing right into his hands,” snarls Velasquez.

  Nor is she under any illusions on that score. There’s no contingency she can adopt that might not be something that Sinclair’s counting upon. Every stratagem she deploys might merely be the inverse of one of his. Every action she takes might be one more step in his master plan. His progeny have operated with all too many plans—all too many scenarios … and maybe they’re all just part of the design of the one who set it all in motion. But now she’s on the point of returning to the Room with the most elite armed escort ever seen. The fact that she doesn’t know whom among that escort she can trust is something she intends to turn to her advantage. She’s going to stay one step ahead of Sinclair yet. She powers through the other side of the membrane—glances back as they come on through behind her, almost laughs at the looks on their faces.

  PART V AUTUMN RAIN

  What’s your problem?” asks the Operative.

  It figures. Alone of all of them, he’s already processed the Room’s vast contents—takes them in with a single glance and the expression of a man who resolved long ago never to be surprised. He’s thus the only one to notice the expression on her face.

  “Sinclair’s no longer here,” she says. “Neither is Control.”

  “Be more precise.”

  “I can’t detect them.”

  “That’s more like it,” says the Operative.

  She nods—starts giving orders. The group starts to deploy onto parallel elevator-trains. Riley, Maschler, and the Operative in one; Sarmax, Velasquez, and her triad in another; Linehan, Lynx, and herself in the third. They drop down toward the inner Room, trying to make sense of what they’re seeing—

  We’re in the kingdom of heaven,” says Linehan.

  “Shut up” says Lynx.

  But it’s true all the same. Even if Lynx is too blind to see, Linehan’s not … and all he can do is thank God for sending him this—for giving him this life, for taking him to this place where all paths converge. He sights his guns on those terrariums sprawling past—vast shimmering walls that contain more greenery then he’s ever seen.

  So the stories were true,” says Velasquez.

  “Every last one,” says Sarmax.

  This is just gone,” says Maschler.

  “It’d be even better if someone explained it,” says Riley.

  “Just keep your eyes peeled,” says the Operative.

  The Room’s stretching out all around her in the panoply of false color and she can’t see any movement anywhere. But the Operative’s right: Sinclair’s still here. Where else could he be? Especially with the Room continuing to power up. Behind her, she can sense the membrane’s energy reaching the critical threshold. The voice of the Operative drifts in past her.

  “No way anything’s getting through that now,” it says.

  “When I want your opinion I’ll ask for it,” she snaps—cuts him off. She gets what he’s driving at, though. Sinclair could have stopped her from leaving the Room. Or maybe not … maybe he hadn’t throttled up the Room’s engines enough by that point. Truth of the matter is that she no longer knows. It’s like she’s driving full tilt into black. She’s on the cusp of future now, can no longer see anything in front of her. She hasn’t felt this way since before she knew she was Manilishi. She figures it’s only fitting—that she’s come full circle. She starts to get glimpses of the inner Room gleaming in the distance.

  What in fuck’s name is that?” asks Riley.

  “The end of the road,” says the Operative.

  “We got movement,” says Maschler.

  No one fire,” she says.

  No one is. They’re just looking at the two insectlike figures standing on the very surface of the sphere that’s now coming into view. Those two figures are looking up at them.

  “You made it,” she says.

  Wasn’t easy,” says Spencer.

  But the directions the Manilishi gave him were enough to do the trick, using one of two teleport chambers with the ability to reach the Room directly. All the others were just sideshows. But all that matters now is—

  “We were being followed,” he says.

  “By who?”

  “They were Rain. Couldn’t tell beyond that.”

  “But you blew the rig behind you?”

  “Yeah. There’s no way they could have—”

  “Assume nothing,” she says.

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “This man you have with you?”

  “Alek Jarvin—”

  “High time I talked to him.”

  You were Sinclair’s man,” she says as she scans his mind.

  “I was cut off in HK when he was arrested.”

  “I know.”

  “He wants to make himself God Almighty.”

  “He may already have,” she says. “Who was following you?”

  “His final triad.”

  She nods. She’s presuming it was the same one that pursued her. But why it would still be operating outside the Room makes no sense to her. The only thing that counts now is in here. Meaning she has to assume that somehow that triad got in too. Thus the dilemma: it’s imperative to destroy your teleportation devices behind you, yet you can never be totally sure you’ve done it. The fact that Sinclair still has servants is one more reason why she’s sought to acquire her own—one more reason why she’s not going in alone. The metal to which Spencer and Jarvin have affixed their arm
or starts to slide aside. The inner Room’s opening once again, in accordance with her zone-instructions. She gives more orders, watches as everyone starts to scramble from the elevator cars.

  Seb Linehan,” says Spencer.

  Linehan looks at him with eyes that seem to have gone hollow. “Spencer,” he whispers slowly.

  “Good to see you again, man.”

  “I’m not the man you remember,” says Linehan.

  “Let’s move,” says the Operative.

  The inner Room’s as she left it. Except for the fact that there’s no longer any presence looming here. She stares through the maze of ramps and girders at the innermost sphere of all. She can detect nothing within. But there’s only one way to be sure. The ceiling of the inner Room slides shut above them as they close in on the hub that sits astride the very center.

  You’ve got to listen to me,” says the Operative.

  “I know what I’m doing,” she says.

  “He’s in here somewhere.”

  “I realize that.”

  “He could be one of us.”

  But she just nods. That’s one scenario she’s playing—that when she first showed up maybe Control had been assigned to hold down the place with deceptions and that Sinclair has only arrived in this Room just now, disguised as somebody else. In which case he undoubtedly thinks he’s got her where he wants her. She welcomes any such thinking. She’s in the final stages of a duel she’s been fighting all her life. Even if she’s only just waking up to that fact. The doors to the core of Room slide open.

  Oh Jesus Christ,” says Lynx.

  Better than any drug he’s ever ridden: glow pours out at him as though the thing in the depths of Moon is really a captured sun. But as his visors adjust, he can see that’s merely a function of the lights and mirrors he’s descending through. Vast pipes run down the walls, shimmering as though through heat. Screens everywhere show views throughout the Earth-Moon system: the Eurasian legions consolidating their hold, the first power in history to achieve total domination of humanity. But now those screens are starting to blur with static—

  “We’re getting cut off,” says Haskell.

  Anondescript interface on just one more piece of piping: the controls at the very hub of the Room are exposed for all to see. She expected as much—expected, too, to see the pod that hangs above them, the door that hangs open, the form-fitted couch that she’s sure is contoured for her exactly. But what she hadn’t expected to see are the three canisters hanging around it—three more pods sprouting out, almost as though they’re the legs of a tripod. Each pod’s doors are partially open, giving them the look of metal flowers. She turns to Carson.

  “You know I have to do this,” she says.

  Just you? What about—”

  “Just defend my flesh.”

  He nods. Perhaps she’s scanned him to her satisfaction. Perhaps his betraying her is merely one scenario among many. He knows that he’s no longer capable of lifting a hand against her knowingly. But he also knows he wouldn’t be the first in whom compulsions arose from out of the depths of past. He watches for a moment as Haskell climbs out of her armor, her strangely inked skin visible on all the places her clothes don’t cover. She climbs into the machine at the Room’s center. He turns, starts giving the orders for a perimeter to be established.

  She pulls herself into the pod while the rest scramble to take up their positions. All but one. Haskell isn’t surprised to see who. Velasquez looks at her—

  “What the fuck are you doing?” she asks.

  “Throwing the last switch.”

  “He wants you to do that, Claire.”

  “How the fuck else am I going to draw him out?”

  Velasquez takes the meaning. “None of my triad—”

  “Keep a close eye on them all the same,” snaps Haskell.

  The canopy closes around her.

  What the hell’s going on?” asks Linehan.

  “Shut up and get ready to fight,” says the Operative. He wasn’t expecting things to get so complicated tactically. Especially because now he sees that everybody’s starting to get it. Everybody knows everybody else is suspect. Just like everybody’s always been …

  “Let’s hope it’s that simple,” says Lynx on the one-on-one—

  —though he’s not surprised when Carson refuses to respond to him. He gets it—the less said the better. He watches the contours of the Room all around him—watches Carson give orders as everyone takes up positions, spreading out along a quarter-klick radius around the Room’s hub. Lynx doubts that whatever happens next is going to be pleasant. Especially because he’s heard enough about this Room to know that there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye. That no normal blueprint could possibly encompass all the spaces it contains. He watches as the machinery throttles up all around him.

  She’s doing the same. It’s all swirling in toward her now and it’s all she can do to keep up with it. Her DNA sequences and brainwaves are interfacing directly with the Room now. The machinery is revving up along its final sequence, approaching the point of no return. Her mind flashes out through the minds of all those around her; she sees even deeper within, still doesn’t see what she’s looking for as she scans every meter of the Room, searching for the pockets and folds of the Room that are beyond all normal scans. She watches the external membrane blaze into critical mass as the energy from those dying outside keeps on pouring into it, keeps on dripping down toward her, surging her awareness to ever greater heights as she suddenly realizes the nature of Sinclair’s servants—

  The Operative’s already on it. He’s whirling to confront them as they open fire. Everyone starts shooting. Riley and Maschler are getting knocked back by fire from every direction. They’re giving as good as they get—focusing on Velasquez and her triad, taking one of that team out as shots rock the core of the Room. The Operative finds himself wondering for a moment about the redundancy of the machinery around him—and then he and Linehan are catapulting into Maschler, knocking his already-damaged suit against the wall, smashing through the visor, watching blood spill down the man’s face.

  Maschler’s eyes are still open, though. “Manilishi busted you,” says the Operative.

  Maschler winces—looks over to where Riley’s dead body is getting dragged out of his suit. “Whatever happened to asking questions first?” he mutters.

  “You happened,” says the Operative. “Where’s Sinclair?”

  “Think I know that?”

  The Operative reaches out with a fist, starts applying pressure to Maschler’s skull. “What do you know?” he asks.

  And even as Carson asks the question, she knows what Maschler’s going to say. Something funny about the consciousness she’s revving through right now—taking the retrocausality that defines her to the next level, effect preceding cause … fucked if she knows how that’s happening, but right now she’s got a couple of answers she hadn’t bargained on. Maschler and Riley weren’t just everyman pilots—weren’t just InfoCom agents either. They were Sinclair’s henchmen all along. And they showed their hand because—

  “She’s got a nuke,” mutters Maschler as his eyes close.

  The Operative realizes immediately who he’s talking about, Haskell’s mental command redundant as he whirls to confront—

  “What are you doing?” says Sarmax.

  “Begging your woman not to do it,” says the Operative.

  Indigo Velasquez looks at them both. Her remaining Rain commando has his guns out. Lynx has drawn as well. Spencer, Jarvin, and Linehan have positioned themselves between the stand-off and Haskell. Velasquez looks around—laughs.

  “So I brought in a bomb,” she says. “So what?”

  “So what the fuck did you do that for?” demands Sarmax.

  “Because this place is accursed,” she says. “We need to—”

  “Defuse that bomb,” snarls the Operative. “Indigo, we’re going to win through yet. You don’t need to—”

  “I do,�
� she says—looks at him with a strange expression—

  And Haskell recognizes its meaning all too well. Indigo’s already made up her mind—already decided that humanity’s better off without this Room. And Haskell’s not even sure she can disagree. Even if America’s been lost, even if the Chinese are going to rule mankind for ten thousand years, even if all is pain and suffering from here on in, it might still be better than living on the sufferance of those within this chamber. Especially if that domination passed to Matthew Sinclair. But Haskell’s seen enough to wonder if Sinclair’s actually counting on that nuke being detonated. Maybe that’s the energy that’ll propel her through the real barriers she’s here to break. Even though those barriers seem to be coming down anyway. The membrane that surrounds the Room has gone white-hot. Her mind’s not far behind—

  Either she hits the brakes or I hit this,” says Velasquez, holding up a fist-sized device.

  “She can’t hear you anymore,” says the Operative. “Indigo,” says Sarmax, “don’t do this.”

  “I have to,” says Velasquez. “All of you—you all might be Sinclair’s slaves. He’s played us all and I don’t even know what to call his fucking game—”

  “Save that it involves playing you even now,” says the Operative.

  “You really believe that?” asks Sarmax.

  The Operative shrugs. His mind is racing with no way out. By the time he fires, Velasquez can detonate. She probably has a dead-man switch anyway. She probably has it all taken care of. She’s made her decision. Sarmax will have to make his. The Operative gets ready to move quicker than he ever has before. He braces himself—

  —just as the three pods around Haskell glow; a suited figure steps from within one, firing as it emerges, catching Velasquez and the Rain commando in a hail of hi-ex rounds, blasting them both into the walls. The nuke tumbles down, bounces off Haskell’s faceplate—doesn’t go off. If it even was a nuke—the Operative’s already rocketing in toward Velasquez. Sarmax scrambles past him—throws himself onto Velasquez—