Prefect

by Alastair Reynolds

  "Back to Jane — did you notice anything else? Did she appear to be under a higher degree of stress than usual?"

  "Well, let's review the situation. We've now lost control of six habitats, four of which have weevil-manufacturing capacity. The agency that now has control of them is poised to grab another four habitats inside the next twenty-six hours, maybe sooner. We'll soon be in double figures, and then it won't be long before we hit triple figures. We're running a mass-evacuation programme to clear a fire break around the infected habitats so that we can nuke the very structures we're supposed to protect. There are probably still going to be people inside those structures when we push the button. Meanwhile, we're losing agents and machines faster than we can think. So — all told — yeah, I'd say Jane's under a bit more stress than usual."

  Demikhov batted aside Dreyfus' sarcasm like a man shooing a fly. "I think the time has come to intervene."

  "Not now. Not until we're done with Aurora."

  "There's been another change in the scarab. Did Jane tell you?"

  "No," Dreyfus said warily.

  "It's pushed one of its prongs deeper into her neck. It's applying pressure to her spinal cord. She can feel it."

  Dreyfus thought back to his last conversation with Aumonier. "She didn't appear to be in pain."

  "Then she was doing a good job of hiding it from you. It's not agony — yet. But the scarab's been changing faster and faster lately. It's sending us a warning, Tom. We don't have much time."

  "But it's only been a few days since the last time we talked. You didn't have a strategy then; nothing that would get it off her in under four-tenths of a second. Are you telling me you've come up with something new since then?"

  Demikhov could not quite meet his eyes. "I've not been entirely truthful with you, Tom. There's always been a strategy, one that we're confident can remove the scarab before it has time to retaliate. It's just that we wanted to make sure all other options were exhausted first."

  Dreyfus shook his head. "Tango was your best option. Yet it still wasn't down to four-tenths or less."

  "There's always been something faster than Tango. We've held it in reserve, barely discussed it since the groundwork was put in place. We always hoped we'd come up with something better in the meantime. But we haven't. And now there isn't any more time. Which leaves us three choices, Tom."

  "Which are?"

  "Option one is we do nothing and hope that the scarab never triggers. Option two is we go with Tango. All the sims — incorporating the work we've put in during the last week — say that Tango will achieve scarab extraction in point four nine six seconds. The sims also estimate that that isn't quite enough time for the scarab to do anything."

  "But there's not much of a margin of error." They'd agreed long ago that no action would be taken until the extraction could be achieved in under point four seconds. Warily, Dreyfus asked, "What's the third option?"

  "We call it Zulu. It's the last resort."

  "Which is?"

  "Decapitation," Demikhov said.

  "You're not serious."

  "It's been analysed into the ground. We have a plan, and we think it will work."

  "You think?"

  "Nothing's guaranteed here, Tom. We're talking about operating on a patient we haven't been able to get within seven and half metres of for eleven years."

  Dreyfus realised that he was taking out his exasperation on the hapless Demikhov, a man who had selflessly dedicated the last eleven years of his life to finding a way to help Jane Aumonier. "All right. Tell me what's involved. How does cutting her head off score over just shooting the scarab right now? And how are you going to get a surgical team in there to decapitate her, anyway?"

  Demikhov steered Dreyfus towards one of the partitions that divided the central area of the Sleep Lab, bright with diagrams and images of both the patient and the thing clamped to her neck. "Let's deal with one thing at a time. We've considered forced removal of the scarab — shooting it off, if you like — since day one. But we've always been concerned that there might be something in it that can still hurt Jane even if it isn't physically connected to her."

  They'd been over this before, but Dreyfus still needed his memory jogging. "Like what?"

  "An explosive device, for instance. We're confident the Clockmaker couldn't have got antimatter inside it, but there might be conventional explosives or spring-loaded cutting mechanisms concealed in the structures we haven't been able to map."

  "Enough to hurt Jane?"

  "Easily. You've seen what it managed to build into some of those clocks. If we can get the scarab on the other side of some kind of blast screen, no harm will befall the patient. That's how we'll kill two birds, Tom."

  "Two birds? I'm not sure what you mean."

  Demikhov tapped a finger against one of the diagrams. Dreyfus had the vague impression that he'd seen this picture a hundred times without ever paying it due attention. It was a cross section of the chamber in which Jane floated.

  "You'll have noted this ring-shaped duct running around the bubble," Demikhov said.

  "I assumed ... " But Dreyfus trailed off. He hadn't assumed anything, beyond the fact that the ring-shaped structure was nothing to do with the bubble itself.

  "We installed that duct, Tom. We opened up that space because one day we feared we might need to proceed with Zulu."

  "What's in it now?"

  "Nothing: it's just an empty ring encircling the bubble. But everything we need to install in it is stored elsewhere in Panoply, ready to go."

  "Show me."

  Demikhov tapped a finger and the diagram tilted around so that they were looking down on the bubble and the ring instead of seeing them in cross section. A series of modular structures were shown being inserted into the ring through a single opening, then pushed around until they joined up to form a kind of thick, barbed necklace.

  "What is it?"

  "A guillotine," Demikhov said, matter-of-factly. "When the structures are in place, they'll project those bladed segments through the wall of the sphere. We've weakened the outer wall where they need to cut through, so there's no need to do anything on the inside of the bubble. It'll happen very quickly. The segments will close in and bisect the chamber in two-tenths of a second: well inside our margin of error."

  The diagram flipped back around to cross-sectional form. A figure appeared, floating in the middle of the chamber. A red line bisected the figure's neck. The blades sprang through the wall, severing the figure's head from its body. The head floated up into one half of the bisected space. The decapitated body floated down into the other half.

  "We cut high enough to remove the scarab," Demikhov said. "We bisect between the submaxillary triangle and the hyoid bone. If we're lucky, we get a clean separation of the third and fourth cervical vertebra. The scarab goes into the lower half. Even if it blows up, the blades will have interlocked to form a blastproof shield."

  "What about Jane's body?" Dreyfus said.

  "We don't care about the body. We'll grow her a new one, or fix any damage the old one sustains. Then we re-attach the head. But the head's the most important thing. Provided we get a clean decapitation, she'll live."

  Dreyfus knew he was missing something. "But you still need to get a surgical team in there somehow. She needs to be prepped for the procedure."

  "No, she doesn't."

  "I'm not following."

  "We don't prep Jane, Tom, because we can't. We can't anaesthetize her because that's exactly what the scarab's waiting for. And if she knows what's coming her stress levels are going to shoot through the roof. The only way this will work is if we go in fast, without warning." Demikhov nodded at Dreyfus' reaction. "You see it now, I think. You understand why this has only ever been an option of last resort."

  "This is a nightmare. This can't be happening."

  "Listen to me," Demikhov said urgently. "Jane's had eleven years of living hell inside that chamber. Nothing we can do to her to get rid of the
scarab even begins to stack up against that. She'll have no warning, and therefore she'll have no time to get scared. When the blades close, the upper half of the chamber is ours. Then we send in a crash surgical team, ready to stabilise Jane and put her under."

  "How long?"

  "Before the team goes in? Seconds. That's all. We'll just need confirmation that the hemisphere's really clear, that the scarab hasn't left any surprises, and in we go."

  "Jane will still be conscious at that point, won't she?"

  The question troubled Demikhov visibly. "There's anecdotal evidence ... but I really wouldn't put too much store by it. The shock of blood loss is just as likely to plunge her into deep unconsciousness within five to seven seconds. Clinical death, if you like."

  "But you can't guarantee that. You can't promise me that she won't have awareness after those blades have closed."

  "No," Demikhov said. "I can't."

  "She has to be told, Doctor."

  "She's always made it clear that we don't need her consent to attempt an extraction."

  "But this isn't the same as sending in a servitor to disarm the scarab," Dreyfus protested. "This is a completely different form of intervention, one that'll probably involve pain and distress above and beyond anything Jane's ever expected to endure."

  "I agree wholeheartedly. I also think that's exactly why we can't breathe a word of this to her."

  Dreyfus looked at the diagram again. He recalled the red line cutting through Jane's neck, just above the point where the scarab was attached. "The position of those blades is fixed, right? You can't steer them if she's not floating at the right height?"

  "That's correct."

  "So how will you be able to cut in the right place?"

  "We mount a laser on the door. It's small enough that she won't notice it. The laser draws a line across Jane, indicating where the blades will pass."

  "Cut. That's the word you're looking for."

  "Thank you, but I'm fully aware of what we're contemplating here. I'm not taking any of this lightly."

  "And what happens if the line doesn't hit her in the right spot?"

  "We wait," Demikhov said. "She bobs up and down. Sometimes she does it herself, paddling the air. Sometimes it's just currents in the chamber, pushing her around. But sooner or later that line's going to touch the right spot." He looked hard at Dreyfus. "My hand will be on a trigger. It'll be my call as to when the blades go in, not some machine's. I have to feel it's the right moment."

  "What about the crash team?"

  "I've arranged for three shifts. There'll always be one team on stand-by."

  Dreyfus felt numb. He could see the logic. He didn't have to like it.

  "Have you spoken to the other seniors?"

  "They've been informed. I have their consent to proceed."

  "Then you don't need mine."

  "I don't need it, but I want it. You're closer to Jane than anyone else in the organisation, Tom. Even me. From the word go it's always been clear to me that I'd need your permission before I go ahead with this. She trusts you like an only son. How many other field prefects have Pangolin?"

  "To my knowledge, none," Dreyfus said candidly.

  "You're the one she'd want to have the final say-so, Tom." Demikhov shrugged resignedly, as if he'd done all he could. "I've stated the medical case. If you give me the nod, we can install the blades in thirteen hours. She could be out of that room and stable in thirteen hours, ten minutes."

  "And if I say no?"

  "We'll run with Tango. I can't risk doing nothing. That would be true negligence."

  "I need time to deal with this," Dreyfus said. "You should have told me about this years ago, so I'd have had time to think it over."

  "Do you think it would have helped? You'd have listened to me, agreed how unpleasant it was and then shoved the whole matter to the back of your mind because you didn't need to deal with it there and then."

  Dreyfus wanted to argue but he knew that Demikhov was right. There were some horrors it was pointless spying on the horizon. You had to deal with them at close range.

  "I still need time. Give me an hour. Then you can start installing the equipment."

  "I lied to you," Demikhov said softly. "We've already started. But you still have your hour, Tom." He turned away and picked up one of the dismantled plastic scarab models, distracted by some waxy grey internal component, a snail-shaped thing he'd apparently only just noticed. "You know where to find me. I'll be awake, just like Jane."

  * * *

  CHAPTER 25

  * * *

  Dreyfus was leaving the Sleep Lab when his bracelet chimed. It was Sparver.

  "Think you need to drop by the nose, Boss. Caught a couple of fish trying to swim away."

  "Thank you," Dreyfus said, glad that he'd taken the initiative to have Sparver shadow Chen and Saavedra. "I'll be there immediately."

  Sparver had detained them in the docking bay that formed the nose of Panoply's pumpkin-face, the bay that handled cutters and corvettes as opposed to civilian vehicles or deep-system cruisers. As field prefects, the Firebrand operatives were regular users of both light- and medium-enforcement vehicles and would have been familiar faces to the technical staff manning the bay. Although they did not have clearance to take a ship, they had managed to talk their way aboard a cutter that had just come in for refuelling and re-armament and had been well advanced in pre-flight checks when Sparver blocked their escape by closing the main bay doors. Dreyfus would have to reprimand the staff who had allowed the prefects aboard the ship without the right clearance, but for now his only concern was extracting information from the two unsuccessful fugitives. They were still aboard the cutter, the ship still poised on its launching rack, with the doors blocking its egress.

  "I had a hard time tailing them," Sparver said, floating next to the cutter's suitwall, inside the air-filled connecting tube. Two internal prefects flanked him, whiphounds drawn. "For run-of-the-mill fields, these two knew a few tricks."

  "They're not exactly field prefects," Dreyfus said. "That's just an operational cover for what they really do. They're specialists, assigned to a superblack cell called Firebrand. Jane pulled the plug on the cell, but the cell had other ideas. They've been carrying on without her authority for nine years."

  "Now that's just naughty."

  "Naughtier than you think. Firebrand has to take some of the responsibility for what happened to Ruskin-Sartorious." Dreyfus unclipped his whiphound and motioned for Sparver to do likewise. "Let's get them off the vehicle. We can't keep these bay doors closed for ever."

  They set the passwall to yield and entered, Dreyfus leading with Sparver just to his rear. Dreyfus sealed the passwall behind them, with the internals keeping guard on the other side so that there was no possibility of the Firebrand agents escaping back into Panoply.

  Like all cutters, it was a small vehicle with a limited number of hiding places. It was powered, but the cabin illumination was dimmed almost to darkness. Dreyfus fumbled in his pocket for his glasses, but he'd left them in his room before he went to the refectory.

  He called into the cutter's depths. "This is Tom Dreyfus. You both know me by reputation. You're not going anywhere, so let's talk civilly."

  There was no answer.

  Dreyfus tried again. "You don't have anything to fear from me. I know about Firebrand. I know about your operational mandate. I understand that you did what you did because you thought you were doing the right thing by Panoply."

  Again there was no reply. Dreyfus glanced back at Sparver, then pushed further into the ship, in the direction of the flight deck. He made out the watery blue glow of instrumentation seeping around the corner of the bulkhead that separated the flight deck from the adjoining compartment.

  "I haven't come to punish you for the consequences of any actions you may have taken that you believed to be in the best interests of the Band." Dreyfus paused heavily. "But I do need to know the facts. I know that Firebrand was using Ruski
n-Sartorious until just before the Bubble was destroyed. At some point, you're all going to have to answer for the mistake of hiding your activities inside that habitat. It was a mistake, a bad one, but no one's accusing you of premeditated murder. All I'm interested in is why that habitat had to die. Panoply needs whatever Aurora was scared of, and it needs it now."

  At last a voice emerged from the direction of that blueish glow. "You have no idea, Dreyfus. No idea at all." It was a woman's voice — so Saavedra, not Chen.

  "Then it's up to you to put me right. Go ahead. I'm ready and waiting."

  "We weren't just working with relics," Paula Saavedra said. "We were working with the Clockmaker itself."

  Dreyfus recalled everything that Jane Aumonier had told him. "The Clockmaker doesn't exist any more."

  "Everyone believes that the Clockmaker was destroyed," Saavedra said. "But it left relics of itself. Souvenirs, like the clocks in the Sleep Lab and the thing clamped to Jane. And other things, too. We got to study them. We thought they were toys, puzzles, vicious little trinkets. Mostly, they were. But not the one we opened nine years ago."

  "What was it?"

  "The Clockmaker had encapsulated itself, squeezed its essence down into one of the relics. It knew Panoply was closing in on it eleven years ago, so it survived by tricking us. It compressed itself into a seed and waited for us to find it." Before Dreyfus could frame an objection, she continued: "It had to discard much of itself, accept a weakening of both its intellectual and physical capabilities. It did so willingly because it knew it had no other option. And also because it knew it could rebuild all that it lost at some point in the future."

  Dreyfus pushed himself closer to the flight deck. "And you — we — helped it?"

  "It was a mistake. But when we reactivated the Clockmaker, it was still weak, still ineffectual compared to its former embodiment. Even so, it still nearly won."

  "How much of this did Jane know?" Dreyfus asked, beginning to wonder why Lansing Chen wasn't contributing to the conversation.

  "She was informed that one of the relics had run amok. She was never told that it was the Clockmaker itself that had come back from the grave. It was felt that the news would have been too upsetting."