Jo-Jo remembered how it was: ‘esque bodies flung across the floor of the food court on Dowl, Saqr gorging on their body fluids. The adrenaline that had poured through him then now threatened to overcome his self-control, but Randall kept steady pressure on his head, pressing so hard that the pain across the bridge of his nose began to overshadow his fear.
She’s breakin’ my nose!
How long did they stay in that position? The only thing Jo-Jo registered clearly was when the pressure suddenly eased and the acute pain across the bridge of his nose faded. He turned his head sideways. Randall’s breath was warm and slightly rancid in his face.
‘We go quiet and quick,’ she whispered. ‘Straight home while they’re inside here.’
‘What if there’re more out there?’ he whispered back.
‘We’re fucked.’ Then she added, ‘But we’re fucked if we stay in here. If there’s more, split up. They’re slow to make decisions. But once they have, they move real quick.’
He heard her quiet intake of breath as she bunched up and leapt lightly up the stairs. He followed, his movements as quick and agile as he could make them, controlling his breath so that he didn’t gasp.
Outside, he could see better. One of the moons was beginning to rise, its soft glow bringing form and feature to the dark. But the wind was a buffeting torrent of heat.
Randall sped off, sure-footed, to the bare rock, then dropped to her arse and began to slide. He copied her movements, shuffling over the hot dry surface as fast as his limbs would allow.
He didn’t look back until they were once more under the overhang of their own building.
Randall barrelled inside, but Jo-Jo paused to look back. As he did, the moon cracked the horizon and bathed the whole of Mount Pell in bright light. It was a harsh and eerie sight.
‘Get in here!’ Randall whispered fiercely.
Jo-Jo dropped to his hands and knees and backed up. When the door was closed, Randall hauled him to his feet.
‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing? Sightseeing? Who told you to stop?’
Jo-Jo stared at her. He couldn’t see much in the gloom, just the outline of her figure and the blunt edge of her features.
‘I—”
‘You just wanted to bring them right here. Fuckin’ Crux!’
‘What is it, Capo?’ Catchut limped down the stairs.
‘This fuckin’ idiot decided to stand in the moonlight and wave to the Saqr,’ said Randall. She grabbed his arm. ‘Give me a single reason not to break your neck.’
Jo-Jo’s face burned even hotter than the night winds had made it. He fumbled inside his pocket and pulled out the flat pack he’d found in the basement. Shaking off her grip, he thrust it at her.
She snatched it from him without a word and snapped the cover open. Inside were a pair of field binoculars, a nav aid and a friction light.
Her grin showed pale teeth. ‘Well, that’s a start,’ she said.
‘Might be we can scope out the right place. Save us stumbling around all over the mountain,’ said Jo-Jo.
She nodded. ‘Next time, though, you don’t stop anywhere unless I tell you to. Got it?’
He could have argued, but she was right. He’d made a mistake that could’ve gotten them killed. Could still get them killed. He glanced back at the door.
‘Go get some sleep,’ Randall said to them both. ‘I’ll watch the door for a while. Do some figuring as well.’ She patted the binoculars. ‘With these little babies, we can work out where the islands are, and how long it’ll take to fly there.’
‘Yeah,’ said Jo-Jo with feeling. ‘Now all we need is a way to get there.’
THALES
A rush of memories assailed Thales as he entered the port terminal and led the guards and Sophos Lauda to the kaffe where he’d first met Paraburd.
He explained to Lauda how the owner had become furious when he didn’t have lucre, only credit. ‘That’s how Paraburd and I made our acquaintance. I was out of cash, and he offered to pay for my drink. We got to talking. After a while he offered me a job. I saw no reason not to take the opportunity. I was desperate.’
‘Accepting a courier job from a complete stranger seems more than little naive, Msr Berniere.’
Thales flushed. ‘I know that now. But at the time I was distraught and lost. Both my marriage and my future had been derailed.’
Lauda nodded, as if vaguely satisfied. ‘And where did you go then?’
Thales walked past the kaffe and looked around. This section of Scolar’s main terminal had not seen refurbishment for some time, and the scent of fried foods mingled with mould. Thales found the door into the service ways easily enough, but then became confused. Months had passed since his brief walk through them, and so much had happened in that time.
He closed his eyes, trying to block out Lauda’s impatience and the guards’ silent scepticism. He drew the memory to the top of his consciousness by reconnecting with his feelings of betrayal and anger. Rene hadn’t stood by him, and Villon... the Sophos had taken Villon.
He remembered how grateful he’d felt towards Gutnee Paraburd, and his surprise that the warren of service corridors even existed. A lesson, perhaps, that life wasn’t always the way that it seemed, or the first blow to his naivety.
Gutnee had led him inside and turned left.
Thales began to walk that way, replaying their conversation in his mind, hearing his innocent questions and Paraburd’s slippery evasions. His foolishness embarrassed him now, and yet in another way he mourned his lost innocence.
He walked until he found himself standing in front of a featureless grime-smudged door.
‘Here, I think,’ he said.
The four Robes pushed him aside and drew weapons. They burst into the office, and their curt observations floated back out to him almost immediately. It was empty.
Thales and Sophos Lauda followed them inside.
It was the right room, Thales thought; he recognised the damp, the desk at which Paraburd’s Balol assistant had sat and the remnants of the shelves that had contained a mess of medical supplies.
Thales knelt down and retrieved the plastic end of a syringe. ‘This is it. His interior office was there.’ He pointed to the marks on the wall that showed a screen had been attached there. ‘He gave me the uniform and then took me almost straight to the ship.’
Lauda’s lip curled in disgust at both the premises and Thales’s feeble explanation. ‘You may be convinced, but I am not. Escort Msr Berniere back to detention.’
Thales’s heart sank. Mira Fedor had been right: nothing would persuade the Sophos to believe him. They were too comfortable to be aware of the insidious mediocrity creeping up on them.
As one of the Robes grasped his elbow and pulled him to his feet, Thales protested, ‘I am hardly a risk of any kind, Sophos Lauda. What is there to be gained by holding me captive?’
‘You are a dissident, Thales Berniere. That is patently apparent. You spread lies and falsehoods. You even claim that Villon was murdered by the Sophos—’
‘Not all the Sophos! I think that Mianos—’
‘And now these wild accusations of biological warfare being waged on Scolar. What is not apparent is for whom you are working. Is it the warmonger Lasper Farr? Or even the Post-Species that you pretend to abhor? Who pays you to cause dissent on our peaceful world?’
Thales mouth fell open. ‘Who pays me? I could well ask the question of you, Sophos Lauda.’
Lauda flushed. ‘Take him back.’
‘Please... at least believe me about the Post-Species threat. You must close the shift sphere!’
But Lauda left without answering him.
With the Sophos gone, the Robes handled him roughly, shoving him between them. One of them punched him below his ribs. He doubled over, gagging for air.
But they gave him no time for recovery, dragging him along.
For some reason his thoughts flashed to Mira Fedor. He prayed that her circumstances were bet
ter than his, that her good fortune had held.
Let her babe survive.
He didn’t know who he prayed to. The concept of God had always been problematic to Thales. Now, having seen some of the wider galaxy, he felt even further from belief than before. Right now, he felt further away from a god than he ever had. Justice had never seemed more irrelevant. He’d failed.
But as they reached the door to the terminal, a large body hurtled through, slamming it shut and smashing the lock mechanism down with an implement.
The Robes grabbed for their swords, but giant fists wielding a large iron bar dealt with the four of them in a few short breaths.
Fariss stepped away from their fallen bodies and lifted Thales up by the shoulders. ‘I don’t mind you doin’ your thing here, trying to save your world and all. But I ain’t about to let ya rot in some gaol.’ She leered happily. ‘I got plans for you.’
Thales stepped into the big woman’s embrace, burying his face into her chest. ‘Fariss.’
She hugged him tight, then set him on his feet so he could see her face. ‘We need to get out of here till these Sophos fuckers have forgotten about you. You got any ideas?’
TEKTON
Thankfully, Jancz and like left Tekton well alone while the hybrid ‘zoon navigated away from Intel. Hybrids required much more command attention than unfettered biozoons—they were less inclined to think for themselves and had to be watched for neuroses. Or so he’d heard.
This one, he guessed, would be in deep in neuroses; any creature as unhealthy and abused would be.
So Tekton used the time getting the DSD to propagate outcomes from the Post-Species threat. The device, he knew, could be utilised to change things—to alter history before it became so. But how to identify at what point change should be introduced to the system? With so many potential transformations, Tekton felt lost in a sea of possibilities.
Even logic-mind floundered.
In desperation, Tekton focused on Lasper Farr, tracking the Commander’s movements and wishing he could somehow glean an idea of what to do from mere observation. He spent hours and hours on this pursuit, stopping only to steal the short distance to the galley, procure something edible and hasten back to his locked cabin.
Of all the thousands of scenes that he viewed, one image cache particularly caught his attention—Farr and Bethany Ionil on the bridge of his ship, arguing.
Tekton still couldn’t fathom how the device captured such extensive visual feed, or how it reliably relayed the information. One of Sole’s secrets, no doubt.
If only cousin Ra was here to ask. Not that the obstinate fellow ever gave Tekton a straight answer about anything.
The mystery of the device left logic-mind with grave doubts. How could Tekton even know if what he watched was authentic? The events could be randomly generated imaginings, not real occurrences.
And yet free-mind wanted to trust it. After all, Sole was behind its creation, and Tekton had glimpsed briefly—terrifyingly—the depth and breadth of the Entity’s intelligence.
He shuddered, remembering the assault on his senses, the deluge of knowledge and the overwhelming enigma of the universe. It had left him floundering to recover, saturated in the shock of his own limitations.
‘Focus on Lasper Farr,’ he told the device. ‘Closer.’
The star-verse of glittering motes brightened, and he fell forward again, using facial movements to direct and slow his focus. Bethany was there with Lasper, in the place he fell to, and so was a bulky round-faced ‘esque who towered over the pair. The three stood in a large cabin aboard a ship. Lasper’s ship, Tekton thought, recognising the stark lack of decoration in the Commander’s cabin.
Tekton stepped closer to Bethany, assessing her mood and state of mind, all the while wondering how it could feel so completely and utterly real. Did they... Could they know he was there? Was this the present, or had this already played out? A thousand questions tugged at logic-mind, while free-mind let go and immersed itself in the surroundings.
‘Where is it, Beth?’ asked Farr quietly.
Tekton had never seen the Commander look so pale or tense. His displeasure would’ve given Tekton great satisfaction, if the man’s wrath hadn’t been directed at Bethany. She was smart and sweet, and direct in a way that Tekton had found refreshing. She’d also resisted his advances, which made her even more desirable than she’d originally been.
Stop it! Tekton clamped down on free-mind’s akula rush and listened.
‘I don’t have it, Lasper. You’d do better to question your enemies, not your sister.’
‘I’m comforted to hear you say that.’ Her brother gave her a small and humourless smile. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t believe you.’
Bring them in, Farr sub-vocalised so discreetly that only Tekton, in his privileged position of surveillance, could hear.
The cabin door flew open with such force that Tekton stepped back instinctively. Soldiers marched Samuelle into the room.
‘Get her out of that thing,’ Farr ordered.
At gunpoint, they forced the old ‘esque to shed her combat suit.
To Tekton’s acute mortification, the woman was naked underneath. Though her wiry physique had been kept well conditioned by the suit’s muscle stimulators, she was old, and her skin looked several sizes too big for her skeleton. It hung from her neck and belly and arms like a loose shift.
‘Lasper!’ cried Bethany. ‘This is unnecessary. Why are you doing this?’
Samuelle was the one who answered. ‘Cos he’s scared, Beth. Someone’s stolen his little god machine, and he’s shittin’ himself.’ She put her hands on her hips, refusing to be shamed.
Tekton found himself overcome by a gross fascination. He wanted to touch her old body, feel its age. But his attention shifted back to Bethany, who rounded on her brother with a quick, intense fury.
‘You’re insane, brother. Orion is being destroyed around us and you’re worrying about some ridiculous prescience device. Geni-carriers are being reported in thousands of star systems. Thousands of worlds aren’t replying to ‘cast signals, meaning that they’ve either disbanded their shift spheres or been annihilated.’
‘And why do you think that’s happening, Beth?’ said Lasper quietly.
She stared at him.
Samuelle cleared her throat and took a step forward, so that she formed a close triangle with them. Again, Tekton felt an overwhelming desire to touch her.
‘He thinks he can run things with it. One of those god-fuckers gave it to him, and he thinks he can make things go his way. Save us or fuck us over, dependin’ on what he feels like.’
Farr transferred the focus of his gaze to Samuelle. ‘You know nothing, you mouthy old bag of meat.’ He flicked one of the guards a look, and the ‘esque punched Sammy in the back, below the ribs.
The old woman went down without a sound.
‘Lasper!’ screamed Bethany. She leapt to Sammy’s side.
Tekton found himself clutching his own back in sympathy.
Straighten up, fool, free-mind told him.
You’re just an observer, logic-mind reminded him.
But Tekton couldn’t separate himself from what was happening. He knew Sammy, after a fashion. He’d shared a cabin with her for a short time, watched her sleep and dream, and worry. She was a good woman despite her flaccid old age.
Good woman! Both minds choked out an exclamation as Sammy regained her feet with Bethany’s help.
‘He’s rattled, Beth. Lost his grip. He’s blind without that device, vulnerable as you or me. More so, cos we can live without it. He don’t know what to do now. Can’t make a decision without it. And everyone’s waiting for him to do something grand.’
Bethany let go of Sammy and advanced on her brother. ‘I don’t have your device, Lasper. And neither does—’
But a pounding at the door stopped her.
Lasper blinked at one of the guards, who opened it.
Jelly Hob ran, out of breath, into th
e room. His mouth sagged open at the sight of Samuelle’s nakedness. ‘Aww, Sammy.’ He automatically began to remove his filthy tunic.
‘Hob? What is it?’ Lasper gripped Bethany’s arm and shifted her back out of the way. Her face contorted as he held her in a painful grip.
‘It’s yer device, Commander. I come to tell ya. Weren’t Sammy who took it! Or her.’ He pointed at Beth.
‘How do you know?’ said Lasper.
Tekton shifted his invisible presence to stand alongside Hob. Don’t tell him, Jelly. Don’t say anything, he shouted.
Hob draped his tunic around Sammy. ‘Commander, let her get dressed.’
‘Jeremiah!’ rasped out Sammy. ‘Think before you speak.’
He smiled at her, a wrinkled, heartfelt movement of his battered face. ‘Not lettin’ you take me blame, Sammy,’ he replied softly, and looked across at Lasper. ‘Was me, Commander. Least, not me that took it, but me that was there, and let it be took.’
Farr let go of Bethany. ‘Speak plainly, Jelly. Or I’ll skin that dry parchment that keeps your organs in place.’
‘You’ll be doin’ that anyways, I’d be thinking, Commander. Was the Godhead, Tekton, that took it! I found ‘im in here when youse was stationside. He was wearin’ Sammy’s other suit, and fetchin’ to get off the ship.’
‘Tekton of Lostol. On my ship? You’re sure it was him?’
No one spoke.
‘Beth?’
Tekton recognised the dangerous edge to Lasper’s tone.
Bethany did too, but she stood resolute against it. ‘I haven’t seen Tekton since Edo. I thought he’d returned home.’
She didn’t waver or flinch in her reply, and Farr turned back to Hob. ‘Are you saying that Tekton of
Lostol... Tekton... took my device? How...? Did you bring him on board?’
Hob shrugged and nodded. Sammy moved closer to him, her scrawny shoulder touching his.
‘I picked him up fallin’ free in the well on Edo. Not far from yer worshipping place. He wuz in a taxi, bein’ savaged by detrivores. Got him out jus’ in time. Whole thing disintegrated.’ He made an appropriate noise. ‘Can’t think what he wuz doin’ there.’
The Sentients of Orion Page 99
