The Beauty of Destruction

by Gavin G. Smith

  ‘But you said it consumed matter?’ Vic said. Scab assumed the ’sect was taking an interest because Talia was.

  ‘Yes. Consuming matter and energy is the only time that it seems to interact with the visual spectrum, but we think that is merely a side effect of its true purpose,’ the armoured form’s booming voice explained.

  ‘Get to the point,’ the Monk told him. It took Scab a moment or two to realise the odd modulated noise was laughter.

  ‘It is consuming dark energy,’ Churchman said, then paused expectantly. Talia looked confused, as did Vic, though again Scab was sure he was just aping Talia. Elodie still looked bored.

  ‘You know nobody knows what that means,’ Scab growled.

  A rasping sigh emanated from the armour. ‘But they should.’ Churchman sounded sad. ‘In that it’s relevant to this discussion. Dark energy is the force responsible for the expansion of the universe.’

  ‘So if it’s being consumed, it’s slowing the expansion?’ Talia asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Churchman said. Talia looked pleased with herself. ‘If enough of it is consumed then it changes the critical density, which was already quite carefully balanced, and the universe starts to contract.’

  ‘But this would be over a vast amount of time, right?’ Talia asked.

  ‘At the moment,’ Churchman said. ‘So far these attacks have appeared random, spasmodic, perhaps even reflexive. They can be stimulated, which we’re sure is what happened to you in Portsmouth.’ Talia brought her knees up to her chest and hugged them tightly. Scab noticed the Monk move as if to comfort her sister but then think the better of it. ‘But these attacks are increasing in frequency. Entire star systems gone, and if what we believe is correct, that is just a by-product. If they continue to increase exponentially we could be looking at the Big Crunch in the very near future …’

  Scab started laughing. He couldn’t help himself. He doubled over in his seat. Everyone was looking at him now. Acid tears fell from his eyes to sizzle on the carpet. Eventually he managed to control himself. He sat back, sniffing. Talia looked appalled, Vic was staring at him, the Monk looked angry.

  ‘The sociopath act is getting boring,’ she told him. Scab just smiled, saying nothing.

  The Monk opened her mouth to continue her harangue but Churchman held up one massive armoured arm. ‘Beth, please.’

  ‘So it’s breaking the law of energy conservation?’ Talia asked. The armoured form inclined his upper body slightly in what Scab assumed was supposed to be a nod. ‘How?’

  ‘Some kind of naturally occurring bridge effect,’ the Monk said, anger in her voice, still glaring at Scab. ‘One theory is that it is some kind of sentient singularity.’

  ‘We’ve seen it bridge,’ Vic said. ‘When we …’ He looked over at Talia. ‘It bridged into Red Space.’

  ‘It’s taking the dark energy from Known Space and bridging it somewhere else,’ Churchman told them.

  ‘Where?’ Talia asked.

  ‘Maybe here,’ Churchman said, pointing out through the transparent smart matter wall to the swirling crimson gases of Red Space. ‘For all that we utilise Red Space for its coterminous short cuts, we understand little about it, and it defies analysis. It could be expanding. It could be utilising the dark energy in some other way. We do know that Red Space is a younger universe where different laws of physics apply, and that it was artificially created by picking a baby universe out of the quantum foam and inflating it.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Scab asked.

  ‘Discussions with ancient AIs in L-tech artefacts.’

  ‘Created by whom?’ Talia asked.

  ‘The Seeders. It would have required an amount of energy beyond belief. Perhaps this thing that is consuming Real Space is the mechanism for such creation. Perhaps Red Space has always existed as a parasite on our universe. But we do know things are changing. Redshift has become blueshift in living memory.’ Everyone was looking blankly at him now, with the exception of the Monk, who was staring at the ceiling in frustration, and Elodie, who was still studying her nails. Another sighing noise emanated from Churchman’s exoskeleton. ‘The universe, Real Space, humanity’s home, is contracting, becoming smaller, starting to collapse in on itself.’

  ‘And this thing, the squirming maggoty thing, that’s what’s causing it?’ Vic asked. Churchman nodded. ‘What is it?’ Vic asked.

  Neither Churchman nor the Monk answered for a moment.

  ‘We don’t know,’ the Monk said.

  ‘Is it intelligent?’ Scab asked.

  The Monk looked over at Churchman’s armoured form. Scab had the feeling that the Church’s leader was trying to decide whether or not to tell them something.

  ‘Some of the AIs seem to think so,’ Churchman said. Outside, the capital ship was almost past their position, its manoeuvring engines glowing brightly, subsidiary craft zipping about it as maintenance automatons crawled across its hull like insects.

  A piercing cacophony suddenly filled the room. Scab grimaced slightly and he saw Vic jerk back. Elodie hissed and looked up. Talia grabbed her ears and curled into a ball. Only the Monk showed no reaction. Then the noise was gone.

  ‘What! The fuck!’ Talia shouted at Churchman. ‘I’m not … bionic like everyone else!’

  ‘I am sorry, I wasn’t thinking,’ Churchman rumbled.

  ‘What was that?’ Vic asked. ‘Was that it communicating?’

  ‘It’s a signal within the cosmic microwave background radiation of the universe. We shifted it up sixty or so octaves so humans could hear it.’

  ‘Is that it talking?’ Talia asked.

  ‘Screaming,’ the Monk said. There was silence. ‘Its presence in the CMB means that it’s existed since the birth of the universe.’

  ‘You make it sound like it’s God,’ Talia said quietly.

  ‘No,’ Churchman said simply.

  ‘Does the Consortium know? The Monarchist systems? What are people doing?’ Vic asked, more than a hint of panic in his voice.

  ‘Don’t you get it?’ the Monk asked sarcastically. ‘Nobody cares now. It’s not what you’re bred for.’

  Vic stared at her. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Besides,’ said the Monk, glaring at Churchman. ‘We’ve been covering it up.’

  ‘What? Why?’ Talia cried.

  ‘Because people don’t look for solutions any more,’ Churchman said. ‘They have been conditioned to look for someone to blame. It keeps them divided.’

  ‘The Consortium care about conspicuous consumption, the Bluebloods about decadence, everyone else is somewhere on the survival-self gratification spectrum,’ the Monk added.

  ‘How did it get like this?’ Talia asked.

  ‘It was going this way before the Fall,’ the Monk said quietly.

  ‘And it has been given some guidance,’ Churchman added.

  ‘Who by?’ Talia asked.

  Scab was desperately trying to recall the name of the man they had met under the influence of Key. The tall man. The one who had hired him to steal Talia’s cocoon in the first place. But neither meat nor neunonics could remember him, which shouldn’t happen.

  ‘The organisation that became the Consortium, and their leader. The man you know as Patron, though he has had many other names,’ Churchman told them.

  Talia was staring at him. ‘That makes no sense. He’s helping that thing?’

  ‘As far as we can tell he serves it,’ Churchman told her. ‘All his actions seem to be about stopping any organised resistance against it.’

  ‘Why?’ Talia asked.

  ‘He has some kind of connection to it. We suspect the connection causes a great deal of pain. Beyond that we don’t know.’

  ‘This all seems … I don’t know, so abstract. It’s too big,’ Talia said. Her voice sounded small.

  ‘Patron said I owed him. What has this got to do with me?’ Scab asked. Churchman started to answer but the killer held up his hand. ‘I have a better question. So what
?’

  The Monk was glaring at him.

  ‘Mr Scab, I’m sure that nihilism as a way of life is all very exciting as an adolescent but—’ Churchman started.

  ‘Think of what you’ve just described. What’s worth saving? We were grown by the Seeders, these biotech gods. Why? Slaves? Pets?’ Churchman didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. ‘And we’ve done nothing with our existence. You said it yourself. We’re parasites.’

  ‘There is a great deal more to this universe than the uplifted races.’

  ‘Let them save it then,’ Scab said as he got up and walked towards the door.

  ‘Mr Scab, you’re greatly mistaken. We’re not asking you to do anything. You may stay here and live in comfort if you wish, or you may have the location of the Cathedral removed from your memory and your ship’s, and you can take your chances back in Known Space. We’ll make you as rich as Croesus if you wish. Of course, Miss Luckwicke will have to remain with us.’ The massive armoured form shifted slightly to look down at Talia. Talia looked up at Churchman and then her sister. She smiled and then nodded. Churchman turned back to a seething Scab. ‘I’m intrigued, were you honestly arrogant enough to think we would let scum like yourself anywhere near possible solutions for this? I am simply doing what I promised and providing you with answers to whatever you wish to know. I am sorry if they do not live up to your expectations …’

  ‘On the contrary,’ said Scab. ‘God is real and it’s about to eat everything. Good news, we’ll be leaving soon. Just a few more pieces of business. My … Benedict?’

  ‘As I’m sure you can imagine, our resources are stretched a little thin at the moment but we will help you track down and deal with the possessed Benedict on board the Templar …’

  ‘You have his backups here,’ Scab said, cutting Churchman off. The massive armoured form shifted in his throne-like chair again. Scab was sure that he was being stared at, despite the tinted visor.

  ‘You’re worried about leaving some trace of yourself, aren’t you?’ the Monk said, unable to keep the disgust from her voice.

  ‘I suspect that this will be difficult for you to understand, Mr Scab, but I’m not wiping Brother Benedict’s backups. I’m not going to murder him out of some sense of genetic insecurity on the part of his psychopathic father.’

  ‘Why not?’ Scab demanded.

  The Monk laughed humourlessly.

  ‘Because it’s not the decent thing to do,’ Churchman told him.

  Now Scab started to get genuinely angry. ‘What the fuck are you talking about? It’s going to happen. You decide how hard you’re going to make it on yourselves,’ he said, quietly.

  ‘Do you honestly think we’re frightened of you?’ the Monk asked. Scab turned to look at her with his dead eyes. He felt calm and cold now, like he always did before a fight.

  ‘The next time I kill you it might be in a way you can’t walk away from,’ he told her. She laughed.

  ‘Don’t threaten my sister,’ Talia told him, though she was obviously frightened. The Monk couldn’t keep the look of surprise from her face.

  ‘No,’ Vic said. Scab turned to stare at his ’sect ‘partner’. ‘You can go if you want. If they’ll have me, I’m staying.’

  ‘That’s not how this wor—’ Scab started.

  ‘You are most welcome, Mr Matto,’ Churchman said.

  Scab smiled. ‘She doesn’t give a fuck about you. She was using you.’

  Talia looked down at the floor. Out of the corner of his eye he could make out Elodie smirking. Scab’s olfactory sensors picked up on Vic’s pheromonic misery.

  The ’sect nodded, another human affectation. ‘I know.’

  Scab walked out of the conference room.

  ‘I’m bored,’ Elodie said. ‘I don’t like being bored.’

  4

  Ancient Britain

  You did not fight in winter. Britha was no warrior, but she did know this. In winter your greatest enemy was the cold. In autumn you returned from raiding to tend to the fields and harvest for the cold, dark months when the dead could be heard on the wind. Crom Dhubh and the Lochlannach had given them little choice, it seemed.

  She was sat on an outcrop overlooking a flat plain in a valley between steep hills, many of which were edged with rock escarpments and cliffs. The chill she felt wasn’t just from the cold air. The valley ran from east to west. She could make out the Mother Hill at the western end. She had since discovered that the hill had been sacred to the southron tribe’s Mother goddess, Cuda. It had been a place for the dead and the ravens when she had been there last. Now the magics that ran throughout her flesh allowed her to see movement in the fort atop the hill. She knew they would be the Lochlannach. She could not, however, make out the cave that was the entrance to Annwn where lay Oeth, the Place of Bones where Crom Dhubh dwelled.

  There were a number of small settlements, mostly clusters of roundhouses and granaries. Closer to the west end of the valley, in the shadow of the Mother Hill, she could see a small village with its own longhall but she knew it was deserted. Even from this far out she could make out that much of the farmland was overgrown. The crops had not been harvested and the frost was killing them.

  She tried to suppress the irritation of seeing the field rot, sheep, aurochs and smaller cattle left to roam free. She suspected that there were so many of the beasts wandering the valley because the wolves, bears and lynx knew that the western end of the valley was inhabited by the corrupt and unnatural.

  With one hand Britha pulled the furs she had bartered for tighter around herself. The other grasped the longspear that she was leaning on. It was mostly a memory of cold. Even the shaved side of her head did not feel the cold as she once had. She had decided to keep her hair as it was. They did not trust her, so they may as well fear her. Her odd appearance went some way towards accomplishing this.

  Below, the warband snaked into the valley. The scouts, mostly women of the Iceni with their lynx headdresses, and ash-painted members of gwyllion, had gone in first. Only a few of them had carried weapons blessed by the Red Chalice – though perhaps empowered was a better word. Or even cursed. The scouts certainly didn’t lack for courage in Britha’s eyes.

  There were outriders spotted around the high ground watching over the warband as they entered the valley. After the final battle with the Muileartach’s spawn they had continued marching north. Each night as they camped Bladud had called his advisors to him, which now included herself. They may not have trusted her but it seemed they had started to value her wisdom, her knowledge.

  They had sent scouts into the wasteland in the south. Goibhniu had been true to his word. The land there was starting to recover. Natural plant life seemed to be returning, albeit unnaturally fast. Bladud was reluctant to send people back into the wasteland to live and Britha had agreed with this.

  They had discussed what to do with the survivors who marched with them. Bladud had spoken to all the landsfolk. He had told them he would send them to their homes in groups if they lived north of what the southrons were calling Andraste’s Wasteland. If they had lived south then they could go and seek new lives in the north, for the Lochlannach’s raiding had left many lands short of people to work them. Bladud had said they were welcome in Brigante lands. He had, however, explained that if they stayed then they would become spear-carriers and would fight. He left the appeal of vengeance against the Lochlannach unsaid. Many had stayed, and now Bladud had an army, one that was very loyal to him. He had become the saviour of Ynys Prydain. Britha had wondered how generous he had been to the bards who sang of his victory across the land. More warriors from the different tribes had come to join the fight, following stories of glory, magics and power. They could scarcely credit the stories told by those who had lived through the wicker man and the children of the Muileartach’s onslaught.

  ‘Act like a rhi long enough and everyone starts to believe you,’ Britha said quietly to herself, her lips curving up into something that came close to a s
mile. She had to admit to liking the Witch King, even having a degree of respect for him, but he was dangerous because he was greedy and too ambitious. However well intentioned he might be, he wanted to tell others how to live. That could only end in war.

  She had been aware of Tangwen’s approach for some time now. The small, wiry warrior scrambled onto the outcrop with her.

  ‘Did you climb up here?’ Tangwen asked. There was disapproval in her voice but the hunter also sounded and looked tired. She had gone into the valley ahead of Bladud’s warband with the scouts. Britha knew that the younger woman was doing just about anything that didn’t require her to take time to think, or sleep.

  ‘I am pregnant, not crippled,’ she told Tangwen. ‘Where is the chalice?’

  Tangwen managed a raised eyebrow at the change in the conversation. ‘Germelqart has it.’

  ‘And if some of the warriors decide that they want it?’ Much of their conversation these days seemed to be about the chalice and its whereabouts.

  ‘They will need to be stronger than me, faster than me, and more cunning than a snake to keep it, and if so then they deserve it. It would not be good for Bladud to hear you taking such an interest in the chalice,’ Tangwen warned. Britha suspected that her constant enquiries were making the other woman nervous. Britha glanced at Tangwen. She smelled of leather, and sweat and the cold earth.

  ‘I will be discreet with my enquiries and speak with only those who I trust.’ Even though they will not, can not, trust me, she left unsaid.

  ‘Look at these fools,’ Tangwen spat. The warband was slowing. Starting to form into a rough circle as they prepared to camp for the night. The hunter and warrior were staring at a number of chariots struggling over rough ground; some of them had to be carried by the landsfolk. Britha laughed.

  ‘Warriors have to have their trappings,’ Britha said. She understood the reason for it but often wished they could be more practical.

  ‘This is no terrain for chariots,’ Tangwen muttered. Britha had agreed with Feroth on the matter of chariots. The only good terrain for them was a really flat beach. Though even then the chariots hadn’t done the Cirig much good. They could hear shouted commands and landsfolk being bullied in the frigid night air. The ban draoi glanced up the valley.