‘I think you know what I want. But let me just ask you this, Michael. If your father got his dearest wish – if he finally found a way of becoming immortal – what then? Wouldn’t that simply prove a curse to all involved? After all, if he were to live for ever, when would you inherit?’
Lever met DeVore’s eyes briefly then looked away. But DeVore, watching, had seen how his words had touched him to the quick. It was what he feared – what his whole generation feared. To be a son for ever, bound by a living ghost.
Lever shivered then shook his head. ‘And this centre… how would you go about selling the idea to my father?’
DeVore smiled and took the young man’s arm again, leading him on, beginning to outline his plan. The most difficult part now lay behind him. The rest would be easy.
Immortality. It was a nonsense, but a useful nonsense. And he would milk it to the last drop. But before then he would carry out a few last schemes of his own. To tidy things up, and settle a few last scores.
*
It was after six when Kim got back to the high-security complex where he was staying. The guards checked his ID then passed him through.
The apartment was in darkness, only the faint glow of the console display showing from the room at the far end of the hallway. He stood there a moment, feeling uneasy. His bedroom was just up a little on the right. He went through, closing the door behind him, then turned on the bedside lamp.
He stiffened then turned slowly, looking about him. The red silk package on the bedside table had not been there when he had left. Someone had been into the room.
He stared at it a moment, wondering what to do. If it was a bomb it might already be too late – merely coming into the room could have triggered the timer. Then he saw the note, poking out from beneath, and smiled, recognizing the hand.
He sat, placing the package beside him on the bed while he read the note. It was in Mandarin, the black ink characters formed with confident, fluent strokes. At the foot of the small, silken sheet was the young T’ang’s seal, the Ywe Lung impressed into the bright gold wax. He read it quickly.
Shih Ward,
At our first meeting I said that if you did as I wished I would tear up my father’s warrant. You have more than fulfilled your part of our agreement, therefore I return my father’s document, duly enacted.
I would be honoured if you would also accept these few small gifts with my sincere gratitude for your help in restoring the Project.
I look forward to seeing you on your return from my cousin’s City.
With deepest respect,
Li Yuan
Kim looked up. The note was most unusual. With deepest respect. These were not words a T’ang normally used to a subject. No, he knew enough of the social mechanics of Chung Kuo to know that this was exceptional behaviour on the young T’ang’s part. But why? What did he want from him?
Or was that fair? Did Li Yuan have to want something?
He set the note down and picked up the package. Beneath the silk wrapping was a tiny box: a black, lacquered box, the letters of Kim’s name impressed into the lid in bright gold lettering. He felt a tiny tremor of anticipation ripple through him then opened it. Inside the box, wrapped in the torn pieces of Li Shai Tung’s warrant, were four small cards. He spilled them on to the bed. They were little different from the computer cards that were in use everywhere throughout Chung Kuo: multipurpose cards that served to store information in every shape and form. There was no guessing what these were until he fed them into a comset. They might be credit chips, for instance, or holograms, or special programmes of some kind. The only clue he had was the number Li Yuan had handwritten on each.
He scooped them up and went through to the end room, putting on the desk lamp beside the console before slipping the first of the cards – numbered yi – one – into the slot in front of him.
He sat back, waiting.
There was the sound of a tiny bell being rung, the note high and pure, then a word appeared on the screen.
PASS-CODE?
He placed his hand palm down on the touch-pad and leaned forward over the dark, reflective surface, opening his eyes wide, letting the machine verify his retinal print. He spoke four words of code then sat back.
There was a fraction of a second’s delay before the response came up on the screen.
AUDIO OR VISUAL?
‘Visual,’ he said softly.
The screen rippled in acknowledgment, like the calm surface of a pool disturbed by a single small stone falling cleanly into its centre. A moment later the screen lifted smoothly from the desktop, tilting up to face him.
He gave the code again. At once the screen filled with information. He scanned through quickly then sat back. It was an amended copy of his contract with SimFic, buying out their interest in him. And the new owner? It was written there at the foot of the contract. Kim Ward. For the first time in his life he owned himself.
He shivered then took the file from the slot and replaced it with the one marked er – two.
As the screen lit up again, he nodded to himself. Of course. It would have meant nothing to be his own master without this – his citizenship papers. But Li Yuan had gone further: he had authorized an all-levels pass. That gave Kim clearance to travel anywhere within the seven Cities, and few – even among the Above – were allowed that.
Two more… He stared at the tiny cards a moment, wondering, then placed the third – marked san – into the slot.
At first he didn’t understand. Maybe one of Li Yuan’s servants had made a mistake and placed the wrong card in the package. Then, as the document scrolled on, he caught his breath, seeing his name, there in the column marked ‘Registered Head’.
A company! Li Yuan had given him his own company – complete with offices, patents and enough money to hire staff and undertake preliminary research. He shook his head, bewildered. All this… He didn’t understand.
He closed his eyes. It was like a dream, a dream he would shortly wake up from, yet when he opened his eyes again, the information was still there on the screen, Li Yuan’s personal verification codes rippling down the side of the file.
But why? Why had Li Yuan given him all this? What did he want in return?
He laughed strangely then shook his head again. It always came back to that. He had grown so used to being owned – to being used – that he could not think of such a gesture in any other way. But what if Li Yuan wanted nothing? What if he meant what he had said in his note? What had he to lose in making such a gesture?
And what to gain?
He frowned, trying to see through the confusion of his feelings to the objective truth, but for once it proved too difficult. He could think of no reason for Li Yuan’s generosity. None but the one his words appeared to give.
He removed the file and placed the last of the cards – si – into the slot.
What now? What else could Li Yuan possibly give him?
It was a different kind of file – he saw that at once. For a start, Li Yuan’s personal code was missing. But it was more than that. He could tell by the length and complexity of the file that it had been prepared by experts.
He gave the access code. At once the screen filled with brilliant colours, like a starburst, quickly resolving itself into a complex diagram. He sat back, his mouth wide open. It was a genotyping.
No. Not just a genotyping. He knew at once what it was without needing to be told. It was his genotyping.
He watched, wide-eyed, as the programme advanced, one detail after another of the DNA map boldly emphasized on the screen. Then, lifting the details from the flat screen one by one, it began to piece the building blocks together until a holo-image of a double helix floated in the air above the desk, turning slowly in the darkness.
He studied the slow turning spiral, memorizing it, his heart pounding in his chest, then gave the verbal cue to progress the file.
The next page gave a full probability set. It numbered just short of six billion p
ossible candidates: the total number of adult male Hung Mao back in 2190. He shivered, beginning to understand, then cued the file again. The next display itemized close-match candidates. Ten names in all. He scanned the list, his mouth falling open again. His father… One of these was his father.
One by one he was given details of the ten: genotypes; full face portraits; potted biographies; each file quite frightening in its detail.
When the last had faded from the screen he called hold then sat back, his eyes closed, his breathing shallow. He felt strange, as if he were standing on the edge of a deep well, ill balanced, about to fall. He shivered, knowing he had never felt like this before. Knowledge had always been an opening – a breaching of the dark – but this…
For once he was afraid to know.
He let the giddiness pass then opened his eyes again, steeling himself. ‘All right. Move on…’
There was a full second’s hesitation and then the screen lit up. This time it gave details of the known movements of the ten candidates over a three-month period in the winter of 2190; details compiled from Security files.
It narrowed things down to a single candidate. Only one of the ten had visited the Clay during that period. Only one, therefore, could possibly have been his father.
He swallowed drily then cued the file again.
The image appeared immediately, as sharp as if it had been made earlier that day. A youngish man in his late twenties or early thirties; a tall, slightly built man, fine-boned and elegant, with distinctly aristocratic features. His light brown hair was cut neatly but not too severely and his dark green eyes seemed kind, warm. He was dressed simply but stylishly in a dark red pau, while about both of his wrists were a number of slender tiao tuo – bracelets of gold and jade.
Kim narrowed his eyes, noticing an oddity about the man. It was as if his head and body were parts of two different, separate beings: the head too large somehow, the chin and facial features too strong for the slender, almost frail body that supported them. Kim frowned then mouthed his father’s name.
‘Wyatt… Edmund Wyatt.’
It was an old image. Looking at it, he felt something like regret that he would never meet this man or come to know him, for, as the file indicated, Edmund Wyatt had been dead eight years – executed for the murder of the T’ang’s minister, Lwo Kang. A crime for which he had later, privately, been pardoned.
Kim shuddered. Was that the reason for Li Yuan’s generosity? To square things up? Or was a T’ang above such moral scruples?
He leaned forward, about to close the file, when the image of Wyatt vanished. For a moment the screen was blank then it lit up again.
GENOTYPE PREDICT: FEMALE SOURCE.
He called hold, his voice almost failing him, his heart hammering.
For a long time he sat there, hunched forward in his chair, staring at the heading, then, in a voice that was almost a whisper, he gave the cue.
First came the genotype: the puzzle pieces of DNA that would interlock with Edmund Wyatt’s to produce his own. He watched as they formed a double helix in the air. Then, dramatically, they vanished, replaced not by further figures but by a computer graphics simulation – a full-length 3-D portrait of a naked woman.
He gasped then shook his head, not quite believing what he saw. It was his mother. Though he had not seen her in almost a dozen years, he knew at once that it was her. But not as she had been. No, this was not at all like the scrawny, lank-haired, dugless creature he had known.
He almost laughed at the absurdity of the image, but a far stronger feeling – that of bitterness – choked back the laughter.
He moaned and looked away, the feeling of loss so great that, for a moment, it threatened to unhinge him.
‘Mother…’ he whispered, his eyes blurring over. ‘Mother…’
The computer had made assumptions. It was programmed to assume a normal Above diet, normal Above life-expectations. These it had fed into its simulation, producing something that, had such conditions prevailed down there in the Clay, would have been quite accurate. But as it was…
Kim looked at the image again, staring open-mouthed at a portrait of his mother as she might have been: at a dark-haired beauty, strong-limbed and voluptuous, full-breasted and a good two ch’i taller than she had been in life. A strong, handsome woman.
He shuddered, angered – it was awful, like some dreadful mockery – then shook his head. No. The reality – the truth – that was grotesque. And this?
He hesitated, afraid to use the word; but there was no other way of describing the image that floated there in the darkness.
It was beautiful.
The image was a lie. And yet it was his mother. There was no doubt of that. He had thought her gone from mind, all trace of her erased. After all, he had been little more than four when the tribe had taken him. But now the memories came back, like ghosts, taunting, torturing him.
He had only to close his eyes and he could see her crouched there beneath the low stone wall, just after they had escaped from the Myghtern’s brothel, her eyes bright with excitement. Could see her lying beside him in the darkness, reaching out to hold him close, her thin arms curled about him. Could see her, later, scrambling across the rocks in the shadow of the Wall, hunting, her emaciated form flexing and unflexing as she tracked some pallid, rat-like creature. Could see her turn, staring back at him, a smile on her lips and in her dark, well-rounded eyes.
Could see her…
He covered his eyes, pressing his palms tight into the sockets as if to block out these visions, a single, wavering note of hurt – a low, raw, animal sound, unbearable in its intensity – welling up from deep inside him.
For a time there was nothing but his pain. Nothing but the vast, unendurable blackness of loss. Then, as it ebbed, he looked up once more and, with a shuddering breath, reached out to touch her.
His fingers brushed the air; passed through the beautiful, insubstantial image.
He sighed. Oh, he could see her now. Yes. And not only as she had been but as she should have been. Glorious. Wonderful…
He sat back, wiping the wetness from his cheeks, then shook his head, knowing that it was wrong to live like this – the City above, the Clay below. Knowing, with a certainty he had never felt before, that something had gone wrong. Badly wrong.
He leaned forward, closing the file, then sat back again, letting out a long, shuddering breath. Yes, he knew it now. Saw it with a clarity that allowed no trace of doubt. Chung Kuo was like himself – motherless, ghost-haunted, divided against itself. It might seem teeming with life, yet in reality it was a great, resounding shell, its emptiness echoing down the levels.
Kim picked up the four tiny cards and held them a moment in his palm. Li Yuan had given him back his life. More than that, he had given him a future. But who would give Chung Kuo such a chance? Who would give the great world back its past and seek to heal it?
He shook his head. No, not even Li Yuan could do that. Not even if he wished it.
IN TIMES TO COME…
Chung Kuo: The Broken Wheel is the seventh volume of a vast dynastic saga that covers more than half a century of this vividly realized future world. In the fourteen volumes that follow, the Great Wheel of fate turns through a full historical cycle, transforming the social climate of Chung Kuo utterly. Chung Kuo is the portrait of these turbulent – and often apocalyptic – times and the people who lived through them.
In Chung Kuo: The White Mountain, Kim Ward has been rewarded by Li Yuan with his freedom and the funds to set up his own Company, in North America. Only the ‘Old Men’ want to buy his services. They want an Immortality treatment. When Kim refuses, they destroy his Company. But Kim will not bow to them. He would rather become a ‘commodity slave’ and sell his services for seven years to the great SimFic Corporation than do so.
Among the Minor Families, chief supporters of the Seven, a sudden epidemic of ‘willow plum sickness’ now strikes: a virulent and fast-acting form of syphilis �
� a brain-killer that destroys its victims in days. Li Yuan, knowing he must act quickly, is utterly ruthless, killing all those who have the sickness and stamping it out. He is successful, but his actions alienate some of the Minor Family Heads and they seek out Wang Sau-leyan to become his allies. The one-time solidity of the Seven has been reduced to ‘Four against Three’.
When Ben Shepherd visits Li Yuan, we discover that Li Yuan was the father of Fei Yen’s son, Han; that he divorced her so that his son would never become T’ang and thus a ‘target’ in the way his own brother Han had been. It was why he never confronted Tsu Ma. Because he never knew.
But it is Kao Chen’s experiences as a guard at Kwibesi, a detention camp in Africa (in view of Kilimanjaro, the White Mountain), that colour this volume. His experience of Li Yuan’s camp for captured terrorists changes Chen’s belief in what he’s doing. The sheer inhumanity of it makes him challenge his sense of duty. He realizes that there are no real solutions, ‘only degrees of wrongness’.
CHARACTER LISTING
MAJOR CHARACTERS
Ascher, Emily
Trained as an economist, she joined the Ping Tiao revolutionary party at the turn of the century, becoming one of its policy-formulating ‘Council of Five’. A passionate fighter for social justice, she was also once the lover of the Ping Tiao’s unofficial leader, Bent Gesell.
DeVore, Howard
A one-time major in the T’ang’s Security forces, he has become the leading figure in the struggle against the Seven. A highly intelligent and coldly logical man, he is the puppetmaster behind the scenes as the great ‘War of the Two Directions’ takes a new turn.
Ebert, Hans
Son of Klaus Ebert and heir to the vast GenSyn Corporation, he is a captain in the Security forces, admired and trusted by his superiors. Ebert is a complex young man: a brave and intelligent officer, he also has a selfish, dissolute and rather cruel streak.
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